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WORKS 


OP 


CHARLES DICKENS. 

(gtiition. 

Illustrated from Designs by Darley and GUberL 


BARNABY RUDGE. 
SKETCHES. — Part H. 


ruuu VOLUMES jy oxs. 



NEW YORK: 

PUBLISHED BY HURD AND HOUGHTON. 
CamSnlfge: Prw'iE?. 

1871. 


Intered accoroing to Act of Congress, in the 1887) if 
Hurd and Houghton. 

in the Cl^’s Office of the District Court fbr the Southern Distiiel if 

New York. 





RIVERSIDE, CAMBRIDGR. 
tTIREOTTPED AND PRINTED •! 
R. 0. HOUGHTON AND COMPANY 




BARNABY RUDGE. 

A TALE OF THE RIOTS OF 'EIGHTY, 


VOLUME I. 






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PREFACE. 



As it is Mr. Waterton’s opinion that ravens are 
gradually becoming extinct in England, I offer a few 
words here about mine. 

The raven in this story is a compound of two great 
originals, of whom I have been, at different times, the 
proud possessor. The first was in the bloom of his 
youth, when he was discovered in a modest retirement 
in London, by a friend of mine, and given to me. fie 
had from the first, as Sir Hugh Evans says of Anne 
Page, “ good gifts,” which he improved by study and 
attention in a most exemplary manner. He slept in 
a stable — generally on horseback — and so terrified 
a Newfoundland dog by his preternatural sagacity, 
that he has been known, by the mere superiority of 
his genius, to walk off unmolested with the dog’s din 
ler, from before his face. He was rapidly rising in 
acquirements and virtues, when, in an evil hour, his 
stable was newly painted. He observed the workmen 
closely, saw that they were careful of the paint, and 


PREFACE. 


?i 

immediately burned to possess it. On their going to 
dinner, he ate up all they had left behind, consisting 
of a pound or two of white lead ; and this youthful 
indiscretion terminated in death. 

While I was yet inconsolable for his loss, another 
friend of mine in Yorkshire discovered an older and 
more gifted raven at a village public-house, which he 
prevailed upon the landlord to part with for a consid- 
eration, and sent up to me. The first act of this 
Sage, was, to administer to the effects of his prede- 
cessor, by disinterring all the cheese and halfpence 
he had buried in the garden — a work of immense 
labor and research, to which he devoted all the ener- 
gies of his mind. When he had achieved this task, 
he applied himself to the acquisition of stable language, 
in which he soon became such an adept, that he would 
perch outside my window and drive imaginary horses 
with great skill, all day. Perhaps even I never saw 
him at his best, for his former master sent his duty 
with him, “ and if I wished the bird to come out very 
strong, would I be so good as show him a drunken 
man” — which I never did, having (unfortunately) 
none but sober people at hand. But I could hardly 
have respected him more, whatever the stimulating 
inlluences of this sight might have been. He had not 
the least respect, I am sorry to say, for me in return, 
or for anybody but the cook; to whom he was at- 
tached — but only, I fear, as a Policeman might have 


PREFACE. 


vii 


been. Once, I met him unexpectedly, about half a 
mile off, walking down the middle of the public street, 
attended by a pretty, large crowd, and spontaneously 
exhibiting the whole of his accomplishments. His 
gravity under those trying circumstances, I never can 
forget, nor the extraordinary gallantry with which, re- 
fusing to be brought home, he defended himself behind 
a pump, until overpowered by numbers. It may have 
been th t he was too bright a genius to live long, or 
it may have been that he took some pernicious sub- 
stance into his bill, and thence into his maw — which 
is not improbable, seeing that he new-pointed the 
gi'eater part of the garden-wall by digging out the 
mortar, broke countless squares of glass by scraping 
away the putty all round the frames, and tore up and 
swallowed, in splinters, the greater part of a wooden 
staircase of six steps and a landing — but after some 
three years he too was taken ill, and died before the 
kitchen fire. , He kept his eye to the last upon the 
meat as it roasted, and suddenly turned over on his 
back with a sepulchral cry of “ Cuckoo ! ” 

After this mournful deprivation, I was, for a long 
time, ravenless. The kindness of another friend at 
lengtli provided me with another raven ; but he is not 
H genius. He leads the life of a hermit, in my little 
orchard, on the summit of Shakspearf/s Gad’s Hill; 
he has no relish for society ; he gives no evidence of 
ever cultivating his mind ; and he has picked up 


viii 


PREFACE. 


nothing but meat since I have known him — except 
the faculty of barking like a dog. 

Of the story of Barnaby Rpdge itself, I do not 
think I can say anything here, more to the purpose, 
than the following passages from the original Preface. 

“No account of the Gordon Riots having been to 
my knowledge introduced into any Work of Fiction, and 
the subject presenting very extraordinary and remark- 
able features, I was led to project this Tale. 

“It is unnecessary to say, that those shameful tu- 
mults, wliile they reflect indelible disgrace upon the 
time in which they occurred, and all who had act or 
part in them, teach a good lesson. That what we 
falsely call a religious cry is easily raised by men who 
have no religion, and who in their daily practice set at 
nought the commonest principles of right and wrong; 
that it is begotten of intolerance and persecution ; that 
it is senseless, besotted, inveterate, and unmerciful ; all 
History teaches us. But perhaps we do not know it 
in our hearts too well, to profit by even so humble an 
example as the ‘ No Popery ’ riots of Seventeen Hun- 
dred and Eighty. 

“ However imperfectly those disturbances are set 
forth in the following pages, they are impartially 
painted by one who has no sympathy with the Romish 
Church, although he acknowledges, as most men do, 
wme esteemed friends among the followers of its creed- 


PREFACK 


ix 

It may be observed that, in the description of the 
principal outrages, reference has been had to the best 
authorities of that time, such as they are ; and that 
the* account given in this Tale, of all the main fea- 
tures of the Riots, is substantially correct. 

“ It may be further remarked, that Mr. Dennis’s 
allusions to the flourishing condition of his trade in 
those days, have their"* foundation in Truth, and not 
in the Author’s fancy. Any file of old Newspapers, 
or odd volume of the Annual Register, will prove this, 
with terrible ease. r 

“ Even the case of Mary Jones, dwelt upon with 
so much pleasure by the same character, is no eflbrt 
of invention. The facts were stated, exactly as they 
are stated here, in the House of Commons. Whether 
they afibrded as much entertainment to the merry gen-- 
tlemen assembled there, as some other most aflecting 
circumstances of a similar nature mentioned by Sir 
Samuel Romilly, is not recorded.”, 

That the case of Mary Jones may speak the more 
emphatically for itself, I now subjoin it, as related by 
Sir William Meredith in a speech in Parliament, 
‘‘on Frequent Executions,” made in . 1777 . ,, 

“ Under this act,” the Shoplifting Act, “ one Mary 
Jones was executed, whose case I shall just mention ; 
it was at the time when press-warrants were issued. 


X 


PREFACE. 


on the alarm about Falkland Islands. The .woman’s 
husband was pressed, their goods seized for some debts 
of his, and she, with two small children, turned into 
the streets a-begging. It is a circumstance not to be 
forgotten, that she was very young (under nineteen), 
and most remarkably handsome. She went to a linen- 
draper’s shop, took some coarse linen off the counter, 
and slipped it under her cloak*"; the shopman saw her, 
and she laid it down : for this she was hanged. Her 
defence was (I have the trial in my pocket), ‘ that 
she had lived in credit, and wmnted for nothing, till a 
press-gang came and stole her husband from her ; but, 
since then, she had no bed to lie on ; nothing to give 
her children to eat ; and they were almost naked ; and 
perhaps she might have done something wrong, for she 
hardly knew what she did.’ The parish officers testi- 
fied the truth of this story ; but it seems, there had 
been a good deal of shoplifting about Ludgate ; an 
example was thought necessary; and this woman was 
hanged for the comfort and satisfaction of shopkeepers 
in Ludgate Street. When brought to receive sentence, 
she behaved*' in such a frantic manner, as proved her 
mind to be in a distracted and desponding state ; and 
the child was sucking at her breast when she set out 
for Tyburn.” 


CONTENTS. 


o4 


BARNABT *RUDGE, Vol. I. 

VOL. II. 
Vol. m. 


IASI 

U— 315 
6—315 
5—310 


' ‘ rfi 

SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


CONTENTS OF VOLUME IL 
CHARACTERS. 

(continued.) : ■ ' - 

CHAPTER IX. 


The Dancing Academy • • I 

CHAPTER X. 

S habby-Genteel People .15 

CHAPTER XI. 

Making a Night of it . 31 


CHAPTER XH. 


rhe Prisoners’ Van 


28 


CONTENTS. 


in 




TALES. 


CHAPTER 1. PACK 

The Boarding-House .38 

CHAPTER 11. 

Mr. Minns and his Cousin . S3 

CHAPTER III. 

Sentiment . . . 97 

CHAPTER IV. 

The Tugg’s at Ramsgate . . ' 113 

CHAPTER V. 

Horatio Sparkins 141 

CHAPTER VI. 

The Black Veil . . . . _ 162 

CHAPTER VII. 

The Steam Excursion 177 

CHAPTER VIII. • ^ | 

The Great Winglcbury Duel 207 

CHAPTER IX. 

Mrs. Joseph Porter 230 

Iv ■' CHAPTER X. 

A Passage in the Life of Mr. Watkins Tottle . . « . 244 

CHAPTER XI. 

The Bloomsbury Christening • . 294 

' CHAPTER XIL 

The Drunkard’s Death - .316 


BAKNABY BUDGE. 


CHAPTER I. 

In the year 1775, there stood upon the borders of 
Epping Forest, at a distance of about twelve miles from 
London — measuring from the Standard in Cornhill or 
rather from the spot on or near to which the Standard 
used to be in days of yore — a house of public enter- 
tainment called the Maypole ; which fact was demon- 
strated to all such travellers as could neither read nor 
write (and sixty -six years ago a vast number both of 
travellers and stay-at-homes were in this condition) by 
the emblem reared on the roadside over against the 
house, which, if not of those goodly proportions that 
Maypoles were wont to present in olden times, was a 
fair young ash, thirty feet in height, and straight as any 
arrow that ever English yeoman drew. 

The Maypole — by which term from henceforth is 
meant the house, and not its sign — the Maypole was 
an old building, with more gable ends than a lazy man 
would care to count on a sunny day ; huge zigzag chim- 
neys, out of which it seemed as though even smoke could 
not choose but come in more than naturally fantastic 
shapes, imparted to it in its tortuous progress ; and vast 
stables, gloomy, ruinous and empty. The place was 


12 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


8aid to have been built in the days of King Henry the 
Eighth ; and there was a legend, not only that Queen 
Elizabeth had slept there one night while upon a hunt- 
ing excursion, to wit, in a certain oak-panelled room with 
a deep bay window, but that next morning, while stand- 
ing on a mounting block before the door with one foot 
in the stirrup, the virgin monarch had then and there 
boxed and cuffed an unlucky page for some neglect of 
duty. The matter-of-fact and doubtful folks, of whom 
there were a few among the Maypole customers, as un- 
luckily there always are in every little community, were 
inclined to look upon this tradition as rather apocryphal ; 
but, whenever the landlord of that ancient hostelry 
appealed to the mounting block itself as evidence, and 
triumphantly pointed out that there it stood in the sam( 
place to that very day, the doubters never failed to be 
put down by a large majority, and all true believers 
exulted as in a victory. 

Whether these, and many other stories of the likt 
nature, were true or untrue, the Maypole was really an 
old house, a very old house, perhaps as old as it claimed 
to be, and perhaps older, which will sometimes happen 
with houses of an uncertain, as with ladies of a certain, 
age. Its windows were old diamond-pane lattices, its 
floors were sunken and uneven, its ceilings blackened by 
the hand of time and heavy with massive beams. Over 
the door-way was an ancient porch, quaintly and gro- 
tesquely carved ; and here on summer evenings the more 
favored customers smoked and drank — ay, and sung 
many a good song too, sometimes — reposing on two grim- 
looking high-backed settles, which, like the twin dragons 
of some fairy tale, guarded the entrance to the mansion. 

In the. chimneys of the disused rooms, swallov/s had 


BAENABY RUDGE. 


13 


built their nests for many a long year, and from earliest 
spring to latest autumn whole colonies of sparrows 
chirped and twittered in the eaves. There were more 
pigeons about the dreary stable-yard and out-buildings 
than anybody but the landlord could reckon up. The 
wheeling and circling flights of runts, fantails, tumblers, 
and pouters, were perhaps not quite consistent with the 
grave and sober character of the building, but the mo- 
notonous cooing, which never ceased to be raised by 
some among them all day long, suited it exactly, and 
seemed to lull it to rest. With its overhanging stories, 
drow’sy little panes of glass, and front bulging out and 
projecting over the pathw'ay, the old house looked as 
if it were nodding in its sleep. Indeed, it needed no 
very great stretch of fancy to detect in it other resem- 
blances to humanity. The bricks of which it was built 
had originally been a deep dark red, but had grown 
• yellow and discolored like an old man's skin ; the sturdy 
timbers had decayed like teeth ; and here and there 
the ivy, like a warm garment to comfort it in its age, 
wrapt its green leaves closely round the time-worn 
walls. 

It was a hale and hearty age though, still ; and in 
the summer or autumn evenings, when the glow of the 
setting sun fell upon the oak and chestnut trees of the 
adjacent forest, the old house, partaking of its lustre, 
seemed their fit companion, and to have many good 
years of life in him yet. 

The evening with which we have to do, was neither 
^ summer nor an autumn one, but the twilight of a day 
in March, when the wind howled dismally among the 
bare branches of the trees, and. rumbling in the wide 
chimneys and driving the rain against the windows of 


14 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


the Maypole Inn, gave such of its frequenters as chanced 
to be there at the moment an undeniable reason for pro- 
longing their stay, and caused the landlord to prophesy 
that the night would certainly clear at eleven o’clock 
precisely, — which by a remarkable coincidence was the 
hour at which he always closed his house. 

The name of him upon whom the spirit of prophecy 
thus descended was John Willet, a burly, large-headed 
man with a fat face, which betokened profound obstinacy 
and slowness of apprehension, combined with a very 
strong reliance upon his own merits. It was John Wil- 
let’s ordinary boast in his more placid moods that if he 
were slow he was sure ; which assertion could, in one 
sense at least, be by no means gainsaid, seeing that he 
was in everything unquestionably the reverse of fast, 
and withal one of the most dogged and positive fellows 
in existence — always sure that what he thought or said 
or did was right, and holding it as a thing quite settled 
and ordained by the laws of nature and Providence, that 
anybody who said or did or thought otherwise must be 
inevitably and of necessity wrong. 

Mr. Willet walked slowly up to the window, flattened 
his fat nose against the cold glass, and shading his eyes 
that his sight might not be atfected by the ruddy glow 
of the fire, looked abroad. Then he walked slowly 
back to his old seat in the chimney-corner, and, com- 
posing himself in it with a slight shiver, such as a 
man might give way to and so acquire an additional 
relish for the warm blaze, said, looking round upon his 
guests : — 

“ It’ll clear at eleven o’clock. No sooner and no 
later. Not before and not afterwards.” 

“ How do you make out that ? ” said a little man in 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


15 


tbe opposite corner. “ The moon is past tlie full, and 
she rises at nine.” 

John looked sedately and solemnly at his questioner 
until he had brought his mind to bear upon the whole 
of his observation, and then made answer, in a tone 
which seemed to imply that the moon was peculiarly his 
business and nobody else’s : — 

Never you mind about the moon. Don’t you trouble 
yourself about her. You let the moon alone, and I’ll let 
you alone.’* 

“ No offence I hope ? ” said the little man. 

Again John waited leisurely until the observation had 
thoroughly penetrated to his brain, and then replying 
“No offence as applied a light to his pipe and 

smoked in placid silence ; now and then casting a side* 
long look at a man wrapped in a loose riding-coat 
with huge cuffs ornamented with tarnished silver lace 
and large metal buttons, who sat apart from the regu- 
lar frequenters of the house, and wearing a hat flap- 
ped over his face, which was still further shaded by 
the hand on which his forehead rested, looked unsocia- 
ble enough. 

There was another guest, who sat, booted and spurred, 
at some distance from the fire also, and whose thoughts 
— to judge from his folded arms and knitted brows, 
and from the untasted liquor before him — were, occu- 
pied with other matters than the topics under discus- 
sion or the persons who discussed them. This was a 
young man of about eight-and-twenty, rather above the 
middle height, and though of a somewhat slight figure, 
gracefully and strongly made. He wore his own dark 
hair, and was accoutred in a riding-dress, which, to- 
gether with his large boots (resembling in shape and 


16 


BARXABY RUDGE. 


fashion those worn by onr Life Guardsmen at the pres- 
ent day), showed indisputable traces of the bad condi- 
tion of the roads. But travel-stained though he was, 
he was well and even richly attired, and without being 
overdressed looked a gallant gentleman. 

Lying upon the table beside him, as he had carelessly 
thrown them down, were a heavy riding-whip and a 
slouched hat, the latter worn no doubt as being best 
suited to the inclemency of the weather. There, too, 
were a pair of pistols in a holster-case, and a short rid- 
ing-cloak. Little of his face was visible, except the long 
dark lashes which concealed his downcast eyes, but an 
air of careless ease and natural gracefulness of de- 
meanor pervaded the figure, and seemed to compre- 
hend even these slight accessories, which were all hand- 
some, and in good keeping. 

Towards this young gentleman the eyes of Mr. Willet 
wandered but once, and then as if in mute inquiry 
wdiether he had observed his silent neighbor. It was 
plain that John and the young gentleman had often met 
before. Finding that his look was not returned, or in- 
deed observed by the person to whom it was addressed, 
John gradually concentrated the whole power of his eyes 
into one focus, and brought it to bear upon the man in 
the flapped hat, at whom he came to stare in course of 
time with an intensity so remarkable, that it affected his 
fireside cronies, who all, as with one accord, took their 
pipes from their lips, and stared with open mouths at 
the stranger likewise. 

The sturdy landlord had a large pair of dull fish-like 
eyes, and the little man who had hazarded the remark 
About the moon (and who was the parish-clerk and bell- 
ringer of Chigwell ; a village hard by), had little i-ound 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


17 


black shiny eyes like beads ; moreover this little man 
wore at the knees of his rusty black breeches, and on his 
rusty black coat, and all down his long flapped waistcoat, 
little queer buttons like nothing except his eyes ; but so 
like them, that as they twinkled and glistened in the 
light of the fire, which shone too in his bright shoe- 
buckles, he seemed all eyes from head to foot, and to be 
gazing with every one of them at the unknown customer. 
No wonder that a man should grow restless under such 
an inspection as this, to say nothing of the eyes belong- 
ing to short Tom Cobb the general chandler and post- 
office keeper, and long Phil Parkes the ranger, both of 
whom, infected by the example of their companions, re- 
garded him of the flapped hat no less attentively. 

The stranger became restless ; perhaps from being 
exposed to this raking fire of eyes, perhaps from the 
nature of his previous meditations — most probably from 
the latter cause, for as he changed his position and looked 
hastily round, he started to find himself the object of such 
keen regard, and darted an angry and suspicious glance 
at the fireside group. It had the effect of immediately 
diverting all eyes to the chimney, except those of John 
Willet, who finding himself, as it were, caught in the 
fact, and not being (as has been already observed) of a 
very ready nature, remained staring at his guest in a 
particularly awkward and disconcerted manner. 

“Well?” said the stranger. 

Well. There was not much in well. It was not a 
long speech. “ I thought you gave an order,” said the 
landlord, after a pause of two or three minutes for con- 
sideration. 

The stranger took off his hat, and disclosed the hard 
'eatures of a man of sixty or thereabouts, much weather- 

VOL I. 2 


18 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


beaten and worn by time, and the naturally harsh expres- 
sion of which was not improved by a dark handkerchief 
which was bound tightly round his head, and, while it 
served the purpose of a wig, shaded his forehead, and 
almost hid his eyebrows. If it were intended to conceal 
or divert attention from a deep gash, now healed into an 
ugly seam, which when it was first inflicted must have 
laid bare his cheek-bone, the object was but indifferently 
attained, for it could scarcely fail to be noted at a glance. 
His complexion was of a cadaverous hue, and he had a 
grizzly jagged beard of some three weeks’ date. Such 
was the figure (very meanly and poorly clad) that now 
rose from the seat, and stalking across the room sat down 
in a corner of the chimney, which the politeness or fears 
of the little clerk very readily assigned to him. 

“ A highwayman ! ” whispered Tom Cobb to Parkes 
the ranger. 

“ Do you suppose highwaymen don’t dress handsomer 
than that?” replied Parkes. “It’s a better business than 
you think for, Tom, and highwaymen don’t need or use 
to be shabby, take my word for it.” 

Meanwhile, the subject of their speculations had done 
due honor to the house by calling for some drink, which 
was promptly supplied by the landlord’s son Joe, a broad- 
shouldered strapping young fellow of twenty, whom it 
pleased his father still to consider a little boy, and to 
treat accordingly. Stretching out his hands to warm 
them by the blazing fire, the man turned his head 
towards the company, and after running his eye sharply 
over them, said in a voice well suited to his appear- 
ance : — 

“ What house is that which stands a mile or so from 
here ? ” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


19 


^ Public-house ? ” said the landlord, with his usual de- 
liberation. 

“ Public-house, father ! ” exclaimed Joe, “ where’s the 
public-house within a mile or so of the Maypole ? He 
means the great house — the Warren — naturally and 
of course. The old red-brick house, sir, that stands ii 
its own grounds?” — 

“ Ay,” said the stranger. 

** And- that fifteen or twenty years ago stood in a park 
five times as broad, which with other and richer property 
has bit by bit changed hands and dwindled away — 
more’s the pity ! ” pursued the young man. 

“ Maybe,” was the reply. “ But my question related 
to the owner. What it has been I don’t care to know, 
and what it is I can see for myself.” 

The heir-apparent to the Maypole pressed his finger 
on his lips, and glancing at the young gentleman already 
noticed, who had changed his attitude when the house 
was first mentioned, replied in a lower tone. 

“ The owner’s name is Haredale, Mr. Geoffrey Hare- 
dale, and ” — again he gbanced in the same direction as 
before — “ and a worthy gentleman too — hem ! ” 

Paying as little regard to this admonitory cough, as to 
the significant gesture that had preceded it, the stranger 
pursued his questioning. 

“ I turned out of my way coming here, and took the 
footpath that crosses the grounds. Who was the young 
lady that I saw entering a carriage ? His daughter? ” 

“ AYhy, how should I know, honest man ? ” replied 
Joe, contriving in the course of some arrangements about 
the hearth, to advance close to his questioner and pluck 
him by the sleeve, “ / didn’t see the young lady you 
know. Whew! There’s the wind again — and rain — ■ 
well it is a night ! ” 


20 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ Rough weather indeed ! ” observed the strange man. 
“ You’re used to it ? ” said Joe, catching at anything 
which seemed to promise a diversion of the subject. 

“ Pretty well,” returned the other. “ About the young 
lady — has Mr. Haredale a daughter ? ” 

“No, no,” said the young fellow fretfully, “he’s a 
single gentleman — he’s — be quiet, can’t you man ? 
Don’t you see this talk is not relished yonder?” 

Regardless of this whispered remonstrance and af- 
fecting not to hear it, his tormentor provokingly con- 
tinued : — 

“ Single men have had daughters before now. Per- 
haps she may be his daughter though he is not married.” 

‘‘ What do you mean,” said Joe, adding in an under- 
tone as he approached him again, “ You’ll come in for it 
presently, I know you will ! ” 

“ I mean no harm ” — returned the traveller boldly, 
“ and have said none that I know of. I ask a few ques- 
tions — as any stranger may, and not unnaturally — 
about the inmates of a remarkable house in a neighbor- 
hood which is new to me, and you are as aghast and 
as disturbed as if I were talking treason against King 
George. Perhaps you can tell me why, sir, for (as 1 
say) I am a stranger, and this is Greek to me ? ” 
The latter observation was addressed to the obvious 
cause of Joe Willet’s discomposure, who had risen and 
was adjusting his riding-cloak preparatory to sallying 
abroad. Briefly replying that he could give him no 
information, the young man beckoned to Joe, and hand- 
ing him a piece of money in payment of his reckoning, 
hurried out attended by young Willet himself, wflio tak- 
ing up a candle followed to light him to the house-door. 
While Joe was absent on this errand, the elder Willet 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


21 


and his three companions continued to smoke with pro- 
found gravity, and in a deep silence, each having his 
eyes fixed on a huge copper boiler that was suspended 
over the fire. After some time John Willet slowly shook 
his head, and thereupon his friends slowly shook theirs ; 
but no man withdrew his eyes from the boiler, or altered 
the solemn expression of his countenance in the slightest 
degree. 

At length Joe returned — very talkative and concilia- 
tory, as though with a strong presentiment that he was 
going t(y be found fault with. 

“ Such a thing as love is ! ” he said, drawing a chair 
near the fire, and looking round for sympathy. “ He 
has set off to walk to London, — all the way to London. 
His nag gone lame in riding out here this blessed after- 
noon, and comfortably littered down in our stable at this 
minute ; and he giving up a good hot supper and our 
best bed, because Miss Haredale has gone to a masque- 
rade up in town, and he has set his heart upon seeing 
her ! I don’t think I could persuade myself to do that, 
beautiful as she is, — but then I’m not in love, (at least 
I don’t think I am,) and that’s the whole difference.” 

“ He is in love then ? ” said the stranger. 

“ Rather,” replied Joe. “ He’ll never be more in love, 
and may very easily be less.” 

“ Silence, sir ! ” cried his father. 

“ What a chap you are, Joe ! ” said Long Parkes. 

“ Such a inconsiderate lad ! ” murmured Tom Cobb. 

“ Putting himself forward and wringing the very nose 
dff his own father’s face ! ” exclaimed the parish-clerk, 
ooelaphorically. 

“ What have I done ? ” reasoned poor Joe. 

Silence, sir ! ” returned his father, “ what do you 


22 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


mean by talking, when you see people that are more 
than two or three times your age, sitting still and silent 
and not dreaming of saying a word ? ” 

“ Why that’s the proper time for me to talk, isn’t it ? " 
said Joe rebelliously. 

“ The proper time, sir ! ” retorted hia father, “ the 
proper time’s no time.” 

“ Ah to be sure ! ” muttered Parkes, nodding gravely 
to the other two who nodded likewise, observing under 
their breaths that that was the point. 

“ The proper time’s no time, sir,” repeated John Wil- 
let; “when I was your age I never talked, I never 
wanted to talk. I listened and improved myself, that’s 
what 1 did.” 

“ And you’d find your father rather a tough customer 
in argeyment, Joe, if anybody \vas to try and tackle 
him,” said Parkes. 

“ For the matter o’ that, Phil ! ” observed Mr. Willet, 
blowing a long, thin, spiral cloud of smoke out of the 
corner of his mouth, and staring at it abstractedly as it 
floated away ; “ For the matter o’ that, Phil, argeyment 
is a gift of Natur. If Natur has gifted a man with 
powers of argeyment, a man has a right to make the 
best of ’em and has not a right to stand on false deli- 
cacy, and deny that he is so gifted ; for that is a turning 
of his back on Natur, a flouting of her, a slighting of 
her precious caskets, and a proving of one’s self to be a 
swine that isn’t worth her scattering pearls before.” 

The landlord pausing here for a very long time, Mr. 
Parkes naturally concluded that he had brought his dis- 
course to an end; and therefore, turning to the young 
man with some austerity, exclaimed : — 

“ You hear what your father says, Joe? You wouldn’t 


DARN'ABY RUDGE. 


23 


much like to tackle him in argeyraent, Tin thinking, 
fiir.” 

— “ If, * said John Willet, turning his eyes from the 
ceiling to the face of his interrupter, and uttering the 
monosyllable in capitals, to apprise him that he had 
put in his oar, as the vulgar say, with unbecoming and 
irreverent haste ; “ If, sir, Natur has fixed upon me the 
gift of argeyment, why should I not own to it, and rather 
glory in the same? Yes, sir, I am a tough customer 
that way. You are right, sir. My toughness has been 
proved, sir, in this room many and many a time, as I 
think you know ; and if you don’t know,” added John, 
putting his pipe in his mouth again, “ so much the better, 
tor I a’n’t proud and am not going to tell you.” 

A general murmur from his tliree cronies, and a gen- 
eral shaking of heads at the copper boiler, assured John 
Willet that they had had good experience of his powers 
and needed no further evidence to assure them of his 
superiority. John smoked with a little more dignity and 
surveyed them in silence. 

“It’s all very fine talking,” muttered Joe, who had 
been fidgeting in his chair with divers uneasy gestures. 
“ But if you mean to tell me that I’m never to open 
my lips ” — 

“ Silence, sir ! ” roared his father. “ No, you never 
aie. When your opinion’s wanted, you give it. When 
you’re spoke to, you speak. When your opinion’s not 
wanted, and you’re not spoke to, don’t you give an 
opinion and don’t you speak. The world’s undergone a 
nice alteration since my time, certainly. My belief is 
that there a’n’t any boys left — that there isn’t such a 
thing as a boy — that there’s nothing now between a 
male baby and a man — and that all the boys went 


24 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


out with his blessed Majesty King George the Sec* 
ond.” 

That’s a very true observation, always excepting the 
young princes,” said the parish-clerk, who, as the repre- 
sentative of church and state in that company, held him- 
self bound to the nicest loyalty. “ If it’s godly and 
righteous for boys, being of the ages of boys, to be- 
have themselves like boys, then the young princes must 
be boys and cannot be otherwise.” 

“ Did you ever hear tell of mermaids, sir ? ” said Mr. 
Willet. 

“ Certainly I have,” replied the clerk. 

“ Very good,” said Mr. Willet. “ According to the 
constitution of mermaids, so much of a mermaid as is 
not a woman must be a fish. According to the constitu- 
tion of young princes, so much of a young prince (if 
anything) as is not actually an angel, must be godly and 
righteous. Therefore if it’s becoming and godly and 
righteous in the young princes (a& it is at their ages) 
that they should be boys, they are and must be boys, and 
cannot by possibility be anything else.” 

This elucidation of a knotty point being received with 
such marks of approval as to put John Willet into a 
good-humor, he contented himself with repeating to his 
son his command of silence, and addressing the stranger, 
said : — 

“ If you had asked your questions of a grown-up per* 
son — of me or any of these gentlemen — you’d have 
had some satisfaction, and wouldn’t have wasted breath. 
Miss Haredale is Mr. Geoffrey Haredale’s niece.” 

“ Is her father alive ? ” said the man carelessly. 

“ No,” rejoined the landlord, “ he is not alive, and lie 
is not dead ” — 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


25 


“ Not dead ! ” cried the other. 

“ Not dead in a common sort of way,” said the land- 
lord. 

The cronies nodded to each other, and Mr. Parkes re- 
marked in an undertone, shaking his head meanwhile as 
who should say, “ Let no man contradict me, for I won’t 
believe him,” that John Willet was in amazing force to- 
night, and fit to tackle a Chief Justice. 

The stranger suffered a short pause to elapse, and 
then asked abruptly, “ What do you mean ? ” 

“ More than you think for, friend,” returned John 
Willet. “ Perhaps there’s more meaning in them words 
than you suspect.” 

“ Perhaps there is,” said the strange man, gruflly ; 
“ but what the devil do you speak in such mysteries 
for ? You tell me first,* that a man is not alive, nor yet 
dead — then, that he’s not dead in a common sort of way 
— then that you mean a great deal more than I think 
for. To tell you the truth, you may do that easily ; for 
so far as I can make out, you mean nothing. What do 
j ou mean, I ask again ? ” 

‘‘ That,” returned the landlord, a little brought down 
from his dignity by the stranger’s surliness, “ is a Maypole 
story, and has been any time these four-and-twenty 
years. That story is Solomon Daisy’s story. It be- 
longs to the house ; and nobody but Solomon Daisy has 
ever told it under this roof, or ever shall — that’s more.” 

The man glanced at the parish-clerk, whose air of 
consciousness and importance plainly betokened him to 
be the person referred to, and, observing that he had 
taken his pipe from his lips, after a very long whiff* to keep 
It alight, and was evidently about to tell his story without 
further solicitation, gathered his large coat about him, 


2G 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


and shrinking farther back was almost lost in the gloom 
of the spacious chimnej-corner, except when the flame, 
struggling from under a great faggot whose weight al- 
most crushed it for the time, shot upward with a strong 
and sudden glare, and illumining his figure for a mo- 
ment, seemed afterwards to cast it into deeper obscu- 
rity than before. 

By this flickering light, which made the old room, with 
its heavy timbers and panelled walls, look as if it were 
built of polished ebony — the wind roaring and howling 
without, now rattling the latch and creaking the hinges 
of the stout oaken door, and now driving at the case- 
ment as though it would beat it in — by this light, and 
under circumstances so auspicious, Solomon Daisy began 
his tale : — 

“ It was Mr. Reuben Haredale, Mr. Geoflfrey’s elder 
brother ” — 

Here he came to a dead stop, and made so long a 
pause that even John Willet grew impatient and asked 
why he did not proceed. 

“ Cobb,” said Solomon Daisy, dropping his voice and 
appealing to the post-office keeper ; “ what day of the 
month is this ? ” 

“ The nineteenth.” 

“ Of March,” said the ^ clerk, bending forward, “ the 
uineteenth of March ; that’s very strange.” 

In a low voice they all acquiesced, and Solomon went 
on : 

“ It was Mr. Reuben Haredale, Mr. Geoffrey’s elder 
brother, that twenty-two years ago was the owner of the 
Warren, which, as Joe has said — not that you remem- 
ber it, Joe, for a boy like you can’t do that, but because 
you have often heard me say so — was then a much 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


27 


larger and better place, and a much more valuable prop- 
erty than it is now. His lady was lately dead, and he 
was left with one child — the Miss Haredale you have 
been inquiring about — who was then scarcely a year 
old.” 

Although the speaker addressed himself to the man 
who had shown so much curiosity about this same family, 
and made a pause here as if expecting some exclamation 
of surprise or encouragement, the' latter made no re- 
mark, nor gave any indication that he heard or was in- 
terested in what was said. Solomon therefore turned to 
his old companions, whose noses were brightly illumi- 
nated by the deep red glow from the bowls of their 
pipes ; assured, by long experience, of their attention, 
and resolved to show his sense of such indecent be- 
havior. 

“ Mr. Haredale,” said Solomon, turning his back upon 
the strange man, “ left this place when his lady died, 
feeling it lonely like, and went up to London, where he 
stopped some months ; but finding that place as lonely 
as this — as I suppose and have always heard say — 
he suddenly came back again with his little girl to the 
Warren, bringing with him besides, that day, only two 
women servants, and his steward, and a gardener.” 

Mr. Daisy stopped to take a whiff at his pipe, which 
was going out, and then proceeded — at first in a snuf- 
fling tone, occasioned by keen enjoyment of the tobacco 
and strong pulling at the pipe, and afterwards with in- 
creasing distinctness : — 

— “ Bringing with him two women servants, and his 
steward and a gardener. The rest stopped behind up 
m London, and were to follow next day. It happened 
that that night, an old gentleman who lived at Chigwell- 


28 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


row, and had long been poorly, deceased, and an order 
came to me at half after twelve o’clock at night to go 
and toll the passing-bell.” 

There was a movement in the little group of listeners, 
sufficiently indicative of the strong repugnance any one 
of them would have felt, to have turned out at such a 
time upon such an errand. The clerk felt and under- 
stood it, and pursued his theme accordingly: — 

“ It was a dreary thing, especially as the grave-digger 
was laid up in his bed, from long working in a damp soil 
and sitting down to take his dinner on cold tombstones, 
and I was consequently under obligations to go alone, 
for it was too late to hope to get any other companion. 
However, I w'asn’t unprepared for it ; as the old gen- 
tleman had often made it a request that the bell should 
be tolled as soon as possible after the breath w'as out 
of his body, and he had been expected to go for some 
days. I put as good a face upon it as I could, and 
muffling myself up (for it was mortal cold), started out 
with a lighted lantern in one hand and the key of the 
church in the other.” 

At this point of the narrative, the dress of the strange 
man rustled as if he had turned himself to hear more 
distinctly. Slightly pointing over his shoulder, Solomon 
elevated his eyebrows and nodded a silent inquiry to 
Joe whether this was the case. Joe shaded his eyes 
with his hand and peered into the corner, but could 
make out nothing, and so shook his head. 

“ It was just such a night as this : blowdng a hurri- 
cane, raining heavily, and very dark — I often think 
now, darker than I ever saw it before or since ; that 
may be my fancy, but the houses were all close shut 
and the folks in doors, and perhaps there is only one 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


29 


other man who knows how dark it really was. I got 
into the church, chained the door back so that it should 
keep ajar — for, to tell the truth, I didn’t like to be shut 
in there alone — and putting my lantern on the stone 
seat in the little corner where the bell-rope is, sat down 
beside it to trim the candle. 

“ I sat down to trim the candle, and when I had done so, 
I could not persuade myself to get up again and go about 
my work. I don’t know how it was, but I thought of 
all the ghost stories I had ever heard, even those that 
I had heard when I was a boy at school, and had for- 
gotten long ago ; and they didn’t come into my mind 
one after another, but all crowding at once, like. I 
recollected one story there was in the village, how 
that on a certain night in the year (it might be that 
very night for anything I knew), all the dead people 
came out of the ground and sat at the heads of their 
own graves till morning. This made me think how 
many people I had known, were buried between the 
church-door and the church-yard gate, and what a dread- 
ful thing it would be to have to pass among them and 
know them again, so earthy and unlike themselves. I 
had known all the niches and arches in the church from 
a child ; still, I couldn’t persuade myself that those were 
their natural shadows which I saw on the pavement, .but 
felt sure there were some ugly figures hiding among ’em 
and peeping out. Thinking on in this way, I began to 
think of the old gentleman who was just dead, and I 
could have sworn, as I looked up the dark chancel, that 
I saw him in his usual place, wrapping his shroud about 
him and shivering as if he felt it cold. All this time 
I sat listening and listening, and hardly dared to breathe. 
At Icpgdi I started up and took the bell-rope in my 


30 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


hands. At that minute there rang — not that bell, foi" 
I had hardly touched the rope — but another ! 

“ I heard the ringing of another bell, and a deep 
bell too, plainly. It was only for an instant, and even 
then the wind carried the sound away, but I heard it. 
I listened for a long time, but it rang no more. I had 
heard of corpse candles, and at last I persuaded myself 
that this must be a corpse bell tolling of itself at mid- 
night for the dead. I tolled my bell — how, or how 
long, I don’t know — and ran home to bed as fast as 
I could touch the ground. 

“ I was up early next morning after a restless night, 
and told the story to my neighbors. Some were serious 
and some made light of it : I don’t think anybody be- 
lieved it real. But, that morning, Mr. Reuben Hare- 
dale was found murdered in his bedchamber ; and in 
his hand was a piece of the cord attached to an alarm- 
bell outside the roof, which hung in his room and had 
been cut asunder, no doubt by the murderer, when he 
seized it. 

“ That was the bell I heard. 

A bureau was found opened, and a cash-box, which 
Mr. Haredale had brought down that day, and was sup- 
posed to contain a large sum of money, was gone. The 
stQjvard and gardener were both missing and both sus- 
pected for a long time, but they were never found, 
though hunted far and wide. And far enough they 
might have looked for poor Mr. Rudge the steward, 
whose body — scarcely to be recognized by his clothes 
and the watch and ring he wore — was found months 
afterwards, at the bottom of a piece of water in the 
grounds, witli a deep gash in the breast where he had 
been stabbed with a knife. He was only partly dressed; 


KAENABY BUDGE. 


31 


and people all agreed that he had been sitting up read- 
ing in his own room, where there were many traces of 
blood, and was suddenly fallen upon and killed before 
his master. 

“ Everybody now knew that the gardener must be 
the murderer, and though he has never been heard of 
■from that time to this, he will be, mark my words. The 
crime was committed this day two-and-twenty years — 
on the nineteenth of March, one thousand seven hun- 
dred and fifty-three. On the nineteenth of March in 
some year — no matter when — I know it, I am sure 
of it, for we have always, in some strange way or other, 
been brought back to the subject on that day ever since 
— on the nineteenth of March in some year, sooner or 
later, that man will be discovered.” 


32 . 


BARNABY RUDGE 


; : CHAPTER 11. 

7 

“ A STRANGE Story ! ” said the man vvlio had been 
the cause of the narration. — “ Stranger still if it comes 
about as you predict. Is that all ? 

A question so unexpected, nettled Solomon Daisy not 
a .little. By-dintj of relating the story very often, and 
ornamenting it (according to village report) with a few 
flourishes suggested by the various hearers 'from time 
to time, he had come by degrees to tell it with great 
effect ; and “ is that all ? ” after the climax, was not 
what he was accustomed to. 

“ Is that all ? ” he repeated, “ yes, that’s all, sir. And 
enough too, I think.” 

“ I think so too. My hoi-se, young man ! He is but 
a hack hired from a road-side posting-house, but he must 
carry me to London to-night.” 

“ To-night ! ” said Joe. 

“ To-night,” returned the other. “ What do you stare 
at ? This tavern would seem to be a house-of-call for 
all the gaping idlers of the neighborhood ! ” 

At this remark, which evidently had reference to the 
scrutiny he had undergone, as mentioned in the forego- 
ing chapter, the eyes of John Willet and his friends Were 
(liveried with marvellous rapidity to the copper boiler 
again. Not so with Joe, who, being a mettlesome fellow, 
returned the stranger’s angry glance with a steady look, 
ind rejoined : — 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


33 


“ It is not a very bold thing to wonder at your going 
on to-night. Surely you have been asked such a harm- 
less question in an inn before, and in better weather than 
this. I thought you mightn’t know the way, as you seem 
strange to this part.” 

“ The way ” — repeated the other, irritably. 

I “ Yes. Do you know it ? ” 

* “ I’ll — humph ! — I’ll find it,” replied the man, wav- 

ing his hand and turning on his heel. “ Landlord, take 
the reckoning here.” 

John Willet did as he was desired ; for on that point 
he was seldom slow, except in the particulars of giving 
change, and testing the goodness of any piece of coin 
that was • proffered to him, by the application of his 
teeth or his tongue, or some other test, or, in doubtful 
cases, by a long series of tests terminating in its rejec- 
tion. The guest then wrapped his garments about him 
so as to shelter himself as effectually as he could from 
the rough weather, and without any word or sign of 
farewell betook himself to the stable-yard. Here Joe 
(who had left the room on the conclusion of their 
short dialogue) was protecting himself and the horse 
from the rain under the shelter of an old pent-house 
roof. 

“ He’s pretty much of my opinion,” said Joe, patting 
the horse upon the neck. “ I’ll wager that your stop- 
ping here to-night would please him better than it would 
please me.” 

“ He and I are of diflerent opinions, as we have 
been more than once on our way here,” was the short 
reply. 

“ So I was thinking before you came out, for he has 
felt your spurs, poor beast.” 

von. I 8 


34 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


The stranger adjusted his coat-collar about his facei, 
and made no answer. 

** You’ll know me again, I see,” he said, marking the 
young fellow’s earnest gaze when he had sprung into the 
saddle. 

“ The man’s worth knowing, master, who travels a 
road he don’t know, mounted on a jaded horse, and 
leaves good quarters to do it on such a night as 
this.” 

“ You have sharp eyes and a sharp tongue I find.'' 

“ Both I hope by nature, but the last grows rusty 
sometimes for want of using.” 

“ Use the first less too, and keep their sharpness lor 
your sweethearts, boy,” said the man. 

So saying he shook his hand from the bridle, struck 
him roughly on the head with the butt end of his 
whip, and galloped away; dashing through the mud 
and darkness with a headlong speed, which few badly 
mounted horsemen would have cared to venture, even 
had they been thoroughly acquainted with the coun- 
try ; and which, to one who knew nothing of the way 
he rode, was attended at every step with great hazard 
and danger. 

The roads, even within twelve miles of London, were 
at that time ill-paved, seldom repaired, and very badly 
made. The way this rider traversed had been ploughed 
up by the wheels of heavy wagons, and rendered rotten 
hy the frosts and tha\vs of the preceding winter, or pos- 
sibly of many winters. Great holes and gaps had been 
worn into the soil, which, being now filled with water 
from the late rains, were not easily distinguishable even 
by day ; and a plunge into any one of them might have 
brought down a surer-footed horse than the poor beast 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


35 


now urged forward to the utmost extent of his powers. 
Sliarp flints and stones rolled from under his hoofs con- 
tinually ; the rider could scarcely see beyond the ani- 
mal’s head, or farther on either side, than’ his own arm 
^.would have extended. At that time, too, all the roads 
in the neighborhood of the metropolis were infested by 
footpads or highwaymen, and it was a night, of all others, 
in which any evil-disposed person of this class might 
liave pursued his unlawful calling with little fear of 
detection. 

Still, the traveller dashed forward at the same reck- 
less pace, regardless alike of the dii*t and wet which flew 
about his head, the profound darkness of the night, and 
the probability of encountering some desperate charac- 
ters abroad. At every turn and angle, even where a 
deviation from the direct course might have been least 
expected, and could not possibly be seen until he was 
close upon it, he guided the bridle with an unerring 
hand, and kept the middle of the road. Thus he sped 
onward, raising himself in the stirrups, leaning his body 
forward, until it almost touched the horse’s neck, and 
flourishing his heavy whip above his head with the fer- 
vor of a madman. 

There are times when, the elements being in unusual 
commotion, those who are bent on daring enterprises, or 
agitated by great thoughts, whether of good or evil, feel 
a mysterious sympathy with the tumult of nature, and are 
roused into corresponding violence. In the midst of thun- 
der, lightning, and storm, many tremendous deeds have 
been committed ; men, self-possessed before, have given 
a sudden loose to passions they could no longer control. 
The demons of wrath and despair have striven to emu- 
late those who ride the whirlwind and direct the storm : 


36 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


and man, lashed into madness with the roaring winds 
and boiling waters, has become for the time as wild and 
merciless as the elements themselves. 

Whether the traveller was possessed by thoughts which 
the fury of the night had heated and stimulated into a 
quicker current, or was merely impelled by some strong ^ 
motive to reach his journey’s end, on he swept more like 
a hunted phantom than a man, nor checked his pace 
until, arriving at some cross roads, one of which led by 
a longer route to the place whence he had lately started, 
he bore down so suddenly upon a vehicle which was com- 
ing towards him, that in the effort to avoid it he wellnigh 
pulled his horse upon his haunches, and narrowly escaped 
being thrown. 

“ Yoho ! ” cried the voice of a man. “ What’s that ? 
who goes there ? ” 

“ A friend ! ” replied the traveller. 

“ A friend ! ” repeated the voice. “ Who calls him- 
self a friend and rides like that, abusing Heaven’s gifts 
in the shape of horseflesh, and endangering, not only his 
own neck (which might be no great matter) but the 
necks of other people?” 

You have a lantern there, I see,” said the traveller, 
dismounting, “lend it me for a moment. You have 
wounded my horse, I think, with your shaft or wheel.” 

“ Wounded him!” cried the other, “if I haven’t killed 
him, it’s no fault of yours. What do you mean by gal- 
loping along the king’s highway like that, eh ? ” 

“ Give me the light,” returned the traveller, snatching 
it from his hand, “and don’t ask idle questions of a man 
who is in no mood for talking.” 

“If you had said you were in no mood for talking 
before, I should perhaps have been in no mood for 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


37 


lighting,” said the voice. “ Howsoever as it’s the poor 
horse that’s damaged and not you, one of you is wel- 
come to the light at all events — but it’s not the crusty 
one.” 

The traveller returned no answer to this speech, but 
holding the light near to his panting and reeking beast, 
examined him in limb and carcass. Meanwhile the 
other man sat very composedly in his vehicle, which 
was a kind of chaise with a depository for a large bag 
of tools, and watched his proceedings with a careful 
eye. 

The looker-on was a round, red-faced, sturdy yeoman, 
with a double chin, and a voice husky with good living^ 
good sleeping, good humor, and good health. He was 
past the prime of life, but Father Time is not always a 
hard parent, and, though he tarries for none of his chil- 
dren, often lays his hand lightly upon those who have 
used him well ; making them old men and women inex- 
orably enough, but leaving their hearts and spirits young 
and in full vigor. With such people the gray head is 
but the impression of the old fellow’s hand in giving 
them liTfe blessing, and every wrinkle but a notch in the 
quiet calendar of a well-spent life. 

The person whom the traveller had so abruptly en- 
countered was of this kind : bluff, hale, hearty, and in a 
green old age : at peace with himself, and evidently dis- 
posed to be so with all the world. Although muffled up 
in divers coats and handkerchiefs — one of which passed 
over his crown, and tied in a convenient crease of his 
double chin, secured his three-cornered hat and bob-wig 
from blowing off his head — there was no disguising his 
plump and comfortable figure ; neither did certain dirty 
Inger-marks upon his face give it any other than an odd 


38 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Rnd comical expression, through which its natural good- 
humor shone with undiminislied lustre. 

“ He is not hurt,” said the traveller at length, raising 
his head and the lantern together. 

“You have found that out at last, have you?” rejoined 
the old man. “ My eyes have seen more light than 
yours, but I wouldn’t change with you.” 

“ What do you mean ? ” 

“ Mean ! I could have told you he wasn’t hurt, five 
minutes ago. Give me the light, friend ; ride forward 
at a gentler pace ; and good-night.” 

In handing up the lantern, the man necessarily cast 
its rays full on the speaker’s face. Their eyes met at 
the instant. He suddenly dropped it and crushed it with 
his foot. 

“ Did you never see a locksmith before, that you start 
as if you had come upon a ghost ? ” cried the old man in 
the chaise, “ or is this,” he added hastily, thrusting his 
hand into the tool basket and drawing out a hammer, “ a 
scheme for robbing me ? I know these roads, friend. 
When I travel them, I carry nothing but a few shillings, 
and not a crown’s worth of them. I tell you plainly, to 
save us both trouble, that there’s nothing to be got from 
me but a pretty stout arm considering my years, and this 
tool, which, mayhap from long acquaintance with, I can 
use pretty briskly. You shall not have it all your own 
^ay, I promise you, if you play at that game.” Witl 
.hese words he stood upon the defensive. 

“ I am not what you take me for, Gabriel Varden,” 
replied the other. 

“ Then what and who are you ? ” returned the lock- 
smith. “ You know my name it seems. Let me know 
yours.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


39 


“I have not gained the information from any confi- 
dence of yours, but from the inscription on your cart, 
which tells it to all the town,” replied the traveller. 

“ You had better eyes for that than you had for your 
horse then,” said Varden, descending nimbly from his 
chaise ; “ Who are you ? Let me see your face.” 

While the locksmith alighted, the traveller had re- 
gained his saddle, from which he now confronted the old 
man, who, moving as the horse moved in chafing under 
the tightened rein, kept close beside him. 

“ Let me see your face, I say.” 

« Stand off ! ” 

No masquerading tricks,” said the locksmith, “ and 
tales at tlie club to-morrow, how Gabriel Varden was 
frightened by a surly voice and a dark night. Stand — 
let me see your face.” 

Finding that further resistance would only involve 
him in a personal struggle with an antagonist by no 
means to be despised, the traveller threw back his coat, 
and stooping down looked steadily at the locksmith. 

Perhaps two men more powerfully contrasted, never 
opposed each other face to face. The ruddy features of 
the locksmith so set off and heightened the excessive 
paleness of the man on horseback, that he looked like a 
bloodless ghost, w'hile the moisture, which hard riding 
had brought out upon his skin, hung there in dark and 
heavy drops, like dews of agony and death. The coun- 
tenance of the old locksmith was lighted up with the 
smile of one expecting to detect in this unpromising 
stranger some latent roguery of eye or lip, which should 
reveal a familiar person in that arch disguise, and spoil 
his jest. The face of the other, sullen and fierce, but 
ihrinking too, was that of a man who stood at bay ; 


40 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


while his firmly closed jaws, his puckered mouth, and 
more than all a certain stealthy motion of the hand 
within his breast, seemed to announce a desperate pur- 
pose very foreign to acting, or child’s play. 

Thus they regarded each other for some time, in 
silence. 

“ Humph ! ” he said when he had scanned his features ; 
“ 1 don’t know you.” 

“ Don’t desire to?” — returned the other, muffling 
himself as before. 

“ I dov’t,” said Gabriel ; “ to be plain with you, friend, 
you don’t ?^rry in your countenance a letter of recom- 
mendation.” 

“ It’s not my wish,” said the traveller. “ My humor 
is to be avoided.” 

“Well,” said the locksmith bluntly, “I think you’ll 
have your humor.” 

“ I will, at any cost,” rejoined 'the traveller. “ In 
proof of it, lay this to heart — that you were never in 
such peril of your life as you have been within these few 
moments ; when you are within five minutes of breath- 
ing your last, you will not be nearer death than you 
have been td-night!” 

“ Ay ! ” said the sturdy locksmith. 

“ Ay ! and a violent death.” 

. “ From whose hand ? ” 

“ From mine,” replied the traveller. ^ 

With that he pat spurs to his horse, and rode away 
at first plashing heavily through the mire at a smart trot, 
but gradually increasing in speed until the last sound of 
his horse’s hoofs died away upon the wind ; when he 
was again hurrying on at the same furious gallop, which 
had been his pace when the locksmith first encountered 
him. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


41 


Gabriel Varden remained standing in the road- with 
the broken lantern in his hand, listening in stupefied 
silence until no sound reached his ear but the moaning 
of the wind, and the fast-falling rain; when he struck 
himself one or two smart blows in the breast by way of 
rousing himself, and broke into an exclamation of sur- 
prise. 

“ What in the name of wonder can this fellow be ! a 
madman ? a highwayman ? a cutthroat ? If he had not * 
scoured off so fast, we’d have seen who was in most 
danger, he or I. I never nearer death than I have been 
to-night ! I hope I may be no nearer to it for a score 
of years to come — if so, I’ll be content to be no farther 
from it. My stars ! — a pretty brag this to a stout man 
— pooh, pooh ! ” 

Gabriel resumed his seat, and looked wistfully up the 
road by which the traveller had come ; murmuring in a 
half whisper : — 

“ The Maypole — two miles to the Maypole. I came 
the other road from the Warren after a long day’s work 
at locks and bells, on purpose that I should not come by 
the Maypole and break my promise to Martha by look- 
ing in — there’s resolution ! It would be dangerous to 
go on to London without a light ; and it’s four miles, and 
a good half mile besides, to the Halfway-House ; and 
between this and that is the very place where one needs 
a light most. Two miles to the Maypole ! I told 
Martha I wouldn’t ; I said I wouldn’t, and I didn’t — 
there’s, resolution ! ” 

Repeating these two last words very often, as if to com- 
pensate for the little resolution he was going to show by 
piquing himself on the great resolution he had shown, 
Gabriel Varden quietly turned back, determining to 


42 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


get a -light at the Maypole, and to take nothiilg but a 
light. 

^When he got to the Maypole, however, and Joe, re- 
sponding to his well-known hail, came running out to 
the horse’s head, leaving the door open behind him, and 
disclosing a delicious perspective of warmth and bright- 
ness — when the ruddy gleam of the fire, streaming 
through the old red curtains of the common room, 
•seemed to bring with it, as part of itself, a pleasant hum 
of voices, and a fragrant odor of steaming grog and rare 
tobacco, all steeped as it were in the cheerful glow — 
when the shadows, flitting across the curtain, showed 
that those inside had risen from their snug seats, and 
were making room in the snuggest corner (how well he 
knew that corner !) for the honest locksmith, and a 
broad glare, suddenly streaming up, bespoke the good- 
ness of the crackling log from which a brilliant train of 
sparks was doubtless at that moment whirling up the 
chimney in honor of his coming — when, superadded to 
these enticements, there stole upon him from the distant 
kitchen a gentle sound of frying, with a musical clatter 
of plates and dishes, and a savory smell that made even 
the boisterous wind a perfume — Gabriel felt his firm- 
ness oozing rapidly away. He tried to look stoically at 
the tavern, but his features would relax into a look of 
fondness. He turned his head the other way, and the 
cold black country seemed to frown him off, and drive 
him for a refuge into its hospitable arms. 

“The merciful man, Joe,” said the locksmith, “is 
merciful to his beast. I’ll get out for a little while.” 

“ And how natural it was to get out. And how un- 
natural it seemed for a sober man to be plodding wearily 
along through miry roads, encountering the rude buffets 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


43 


of the wind and pelting of the rain, when there was a 
clean floor covered with crisp w'hite sand, a well-swep. 
hearth, a blazing fire, a table decorated with white cloth, 
bright pewter flagons, and other tempting preparations 
for a well-cooked meal — when there were these things, 
and company disposed to make the most of them, al 
ready to his hand and entreating him to enjoyment I 


4i 


BAKNABY BUDGE. 


• ii 'b‘ 


CHAPTER IIL 

Such were the locksmith’s thoughts when first seated 
in the snug corner, and slowly recovering from a pleas- 
ant defect of vision — pleasant, because occasioned by 
the wind blowing in his eyes — which made it a matter 
of sound policy and duty to himself, that he should take 
refuge from the weather, and tempted him, for the same 
reason, to aggravate a slight cough, and declare he felt 
but poorly. Such were still his thoughts more than a 
full hour afterwards, when, supper over, he still sat wdth 
shining jovial face in the same warm nook, listening to 
the cricket-like chirrup of little Solomon Daisy, and bear- 
ing no unimportant or slightly respected part in the 
social gossip round the Maypole fire. 

“ I wish he may be an honest .man, that’s all,” said 
Solomon, winding up a variety of speculations relative 
to the stranger, concerning whom Gabriel had compared 
notes with the company, and so raised a grave discus- 
sion ; “/ wish he may be an honest man.” 

“ So we all do, I suppose, don’t we ? ” observed the 
locksmith. 

“ I don’t,” said Joe, 

^ “ No ! ” cried Gabriel. 

“ No. He struck me with his whip, the coward, when 
he was mounted and I afoot, and I should be better 
pleased that he turned out what I think him.” 

“ And what may that be, Joe ? ’* 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


45 


“ No good, Mr. Varden. You may shake your head, 
father, but 1 say no good, and will say no good, and 
I would say no good a hundred times over, if that 
would bring him back to have the drubbing he do* 
erves.” 

“ Hold your tongue, sir,” said John Willet. 

“ I won’t, father. It’s all along of you that he ven- 
tured to do what he did. Seeing me treated like a 
child, and put down like a fool, he plucks up a heart 
and has a fling at a fellow that he thinks — and may 
well think too — hasn’t a grain of spirit. But he’s mis- 
taken, as ril show him, and as I’ll show all of you 
before long.” 

“Does the boy know what he’s a-saying of!” cried 
the astonished John Willet. 

“ Father,” returned Joe, “ I know what I say and 
mean, well — ^ better than you do when you hear me. 
I can bear with you, but I cannot bear the contempt 
that your treating me in the way you do, brings upon 
me from others every day. Look at other young men 
of my age. Have they no liberty, no will, no right to 
speak ? Are they obliged to sit mumchance, and to be 
ordered about till they are the laughing-stock of young 
and old ? I am a byword all over Chigwell, and I 
say — and it’s fairer my saying so now, than waiting till 
you are dead, and I have got your money — I say, that 
before long I shall be driven to break such bounds, and 
that when I do, it won’t be me that you’ll have to blame, 
but your own self, and no other.” 

John Willet was so amazed by the exasperation and 
boldness of his hopeful son, that he sat as one bewil- 
dered staring in a ludicrous manner at the boiler, and 
end roring, but quite ineffectually, to collect his tardy 


46 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


thoughts, and invent an answer. The guests, scarcely 
less disturbed, were equally at a loss; and at length, 
with a variety of muttered, half-expressed condolences, 
and pieces of advice, rose to depart ; being at the same 
time slightly muddled with liquor. 

The honest locksmith alone addressed a few words 
of coherent and sensible advice to both parties, urging 
John Willet to remember that Joe was nearly arrived 
at man’s estate, and should not be ruled with too tight 
a hand, and exhorting Joe himself to bear with his 
father’s caprices, and rather endeavor to turn them 
aside by temperate remonstrance than by ill-timed 
rebellion. This advice was received as such advice 
usually is. On John Willet it made almost as much 
impression as on the sign outside the door, while Joe, 
who took it in the best part, avowed himself more 
obliged than he could well express, but politely intimated 
his intention nevertheless of taking his own course un- 
influenced by anybody. 

“ You have always been a very good friend to me, 
Mr. Varden,” he said, as they stood without, in the 
porch, and the locksmith was equipping himself for his 
journey home ; “ I take it very kind of you to say all 
this, but the time’s nearly come when the Maypole and 
I must part company.” 

“ Roving stones gather no moss, Joe,” said Gabriel. 

“ Nor mile-stones much,” replied Joe. “ I’m little 
better than one here, and see as much of the world.” 

“ Then, what would you do, Joe ? ” pursued the lock- 
smith, stroking his chin reflectively. “ What could you 
be ? where could you go you see ? ” 

“ I must trust to chance, Mr. Varden.” • 

A bad thing to trust to, Joe. I don’t like it. I • 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


47 


always tell my girl when we talk about a husband for 
her, never to trust to. chance, but to make sure before- 
hand that she has a good man and true, and then chance 
will neither make her nor break her. What are you 
fidgeting about there, Joe ? Nothing gone in the har- 
ness I hope ? ” 

“ No, no,” said Joe — finding, however, something very 
engrossing to do in the way of strapping and buckling-— 
“ Miss Dolly quite well ? ” 

“ Hearty, thankye. She looks pretty enough to be well, 
and good too.” 

“ She's always both, sir ” — 

^ So she is, thank God ! ” 

“ I hope,” said Joe after some hesitation, ^ that you 
won’t tell this story against me — this of my having 
been beat like the boy they’d make of me — at all 
events, till I have met this man again and settled the 
account. It’ll be a better story then.” 

“ Why who should I tell it to ? ” returned Gabriel. 
“ They know it here, and I’m not likely to come across 
anybody else who would care about it.” 

“ That’s true enough,” said the young fellow with a 
sigh. “ I quite forgot that. Yes, that’s true ! ” 

So saying, he raised his face, which was very red, — 
no doubt from the exertion of strapping and buckling as 
aforesaid, — and giving the reins to the old man, who 
had by this time taken his seat, sighed again and bade 
him good-night. 

“ Good-night ! ” cried Gabriel. “ Now think better of 
what we have just been speaking of, and don’t, be rash, 
there’s a good fellow ! I have an interest in you, and 
wouldn’t have you cast yourself away. Good-night ! ” 

Returning his cheery farewell with cordial good-wili, 


48 


BARNABT BUDGE. 


Joe Willet lingered until the sound of wheels ceased to 
vibrate in his ears, and then shaking his head mourn- 
fully, reentered the house. 

Gabriel Varden went his way towards London, think- 
ing of a great many things, and most of all of flaming 
terms in which to relate his adventure, and so account 
satisfactorily to Mrs. Varden for visiting the Maypole, 
despite certain solemn covenants between himself and 
that lady. Thinking begets, not only thought, but drow- 
siness occasionally, and the more the locksmith thought, 
the more sleepy he became. 

A man may be very sober — or at least firmly set 
•upon his legs on that neutral ground which lies between 
the confines of perfect sobriety and slight tipsiness — 
and yet feel a strong tendency to mingle up present cir- 
cumstances with others which have no manner of con- 
nection with them ; to confound all consideration of per- 
sons, things, times, and places; and to jumble his dis- 
jointed thoughts together in a kind of mental kaleido- 
scope, producing combinations as unexpected as they are 
transitory. This was Gabriel Varden’s state, as, nod- 
ding in his dog sleep, and leaving his horse to pursue a 
road with which he was well acquainted, he got over the 
ground unconsciously, and drew nearer and nearer home. 
He had roused himself once, when the horse stopped until 
the turnpike gate was opened, and had cried a lusty 
‘ good-night ! ” to the toll-keeper ; but then he awoke 
out of a dream about picking a lock in the stomach of 
the Great Mogul, and even when he did wake, mixed 
up the turnpike man with his mother-in-law who had 
been dead twenty years. It is not surprising, there- 
fore, that he soon relapsed, and jogged heavily along, 
quite insensible to his progress 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


49 


And, now, he approached the great city, which lay 
outstretched before him like a dark shadow on the 
ground, reddening the sluggish air with a deep dull 
light, that told of labyrinths of public ways and shop^, 
and swarms of busy people. Approaching nearer and 
nearer yet, this halo began to fade, and the causes 
which produced it slowly to develop themselves. Long 
lines of poorly lighted streets might be faintly traced, 
with here and there a lighter spot, where lamps were 
clustered about a square or market, or round some great 
building ; after a time these grew more distinct, and the 
lamps themselves were visible ; slight yellow specks, that 
seemed to be rapidly snuffed out, one by one, as inter- 
vening obstacles hid them from the sight. Then, sounds 
arose — the striking of church clocks, the distant bark 
of dogs, the hum of traffic in the streets ; then outlines 
might be traced — tall steeples looming in the air and 
piles of unequal roofs oppressed by chimneys ; then, the 
noise swelled into a louder sound, and forms grew more 
distinct and numerous still, and London — visible in the 
darkness by its own faint light, and not by that of 
Heaven — was at hand. 

The locksmith, however, all unconscious of its near 
vicinity, still jogged on, half sleeping and half waking, 
when a loud cry at no great distance ahead, roused 
him with a start. 

For a moment or two he looked about him like a man 
who had been transported to some strange country in his 
sleep, but soon recognizing familiar objects, rubbed his 
eyes lazily, and might have relapsed again, but that the 
cry was repeated — not once or twice or thrice, but many 
times, and each time, if possible, with increased vehe- 
mence. Thoroughly aroused, Gabriel, who was a bold 

VOL. I. 4 


% 


50 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


man and not easily daunted, made straight to the spot, 
urging on his stout little horse as if for life or death, 

The matter indeed looked sufficiently serious, for, com- 
ing to the place whence the cries had proceeded, he 
descried the figure of a man extended in an apparently 
lifeless state upon the pathway, and, hovering round him 
another person with a torch in his hand, which he waved 
in the air with a wild impatience, redoubling meanwhile 
those cries for help which had brought the locksmith to 
the spot. 

“ What’s here to do ? ” said the old man, alighting. 
“ How’s this — what — Barnaby ? ” 

The bearer of the torch shook his long loose hair back 
from his eyes, and thrusting his face eagerly into that of 
the locksmith, fixed upon him a look w'hich told his his- 
tory at once. 

“ You know me, Barnaby ? ” said Varden. 

He nodded — not once or twice, but a score of times, 
and that with a fantastic exaggeration which would have 
kept his head in motion for an hour, but that the lock- 
smith held up his finger, and fixing his eye sternly upon 
him caused him to desist ; then pointed to the body with 
an inquiring look. 

“ There’s blood upon him,” said Barnaby with a shud- 
der. “ It makes me sick.” 

“ How came it there ? ” demanded Varden. 

“ Steel, steel, steel ! ” he replied fiercely, imitating with 
his hand the thrust of a sword. 

“ Is he robbed ? ” said the locksmith. 

Barnaby caught him by the arm, and nodded “ Yes ; ” 
then pointed towards the city. 

“Oh! said the old man, bending over the body and 
looking round as he spoke into Barnaby’s pale face, 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


5 ] 


strangely lighted up by something which was not intel* 
lect. “ The robber made off that way, did he ? Well, 
well, never mind that just now. Hold your torch this 
way — a little farther off — so. Now stand quiet, while 
I try to see what harm is done." 

With these words, he applied himself to a closer ex 
amination of the prostrate form, while Barnaby, holding 
the torch as he had been directed, looked on in silence, 
fascinated by interest or curiosity, but repelled neverthe- 
less by some strong and secret horror which convulsed 
him in every nerve. 

As he stood, at that moment, half shrinking back and 
half bending forward, both his face and figure were full 
in the strong glare of the link, and as distinctly revealed 
as though it had been broad day. He was about three- 
and-twenty years old, and though rather spare, of a fair 
height and strong make. His hair, of which he had a 
great profusion, was red, and hanging in disorder about 
his face and shoulders, gave to his re*stless looks an ex- 
pression quite unearthly — enhanced by the paleness of 
his complexion, and the glassy lustre of his large pro- 
truding eyes. Startling as his aspect was, the features 
were good, and there was something even plaintive in his 
wan and haggard aspect. But, the absence of the soul 
is far more terrible in a living man than in a dead one ; 
and in this unfortunate being its noblest powers were 
wanting. 

His dress was of green, clumsily trimmed here and 
there — apparently by his own hands — with gaudy lace; 
brightest where the cloth was most worn and soiled, and 
poorest where it was at the best. A pair of tawdry ruf- 
fles dangled at his wrists, while his throat was nearly 
bare. He had ornamented his hat with a cluster of 


52 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


peacock’s feathers, but they were limp and broken, and 
now trailed negligently down his back. Girt to his side 
was the steel hilt of an old sword without blade or scab- 
bard; and some parti-colored ends of ribbons and poor 
glass toys completed the ornamental portion of his attire. 
The fluttered and confused disposition of all the motley 
scraps that formed his dress, bespoke, in a scarcely less 
degree than his eager and unsettled manner, the disorder 
of his mind, and by a grotesque contrast set off and 
heightened the more impressive wildness of his face. 

“ Barnaby,” said the locksmith, after a hasty but care- 
ful inspection, “ this man is not dead, but he has a wound 
in his side, and is in a fainting-fit.” 

“ I know him, I know him ! ” cried Barnaby, clapping 
his hands. 

“ Know him ? ” repeated the locksmith. 

“ Hush ! ” said Barnaby, laying his fingers on his lips. 
“ He went out to-day a-wooing. I wouldn’t for a light 
guinea that he sh6uld never go a-wooing again, for, if 
he did, some eyes would grow dim that are now as bright 
as — see, when I talk of eyes, the stars come out ! 
Whose eyes are they ? If they are angels’ eyes, why do 
they look down here and see good men hurt, and only 
wink and sparkle all the night ? ” 

“ Now Heaven help this silly fellow,” murmured the 
perplexed locksmith, “ can he know this gentleman ? 
His mother’s house is not far off ; I had better see if 
she can tell me w'ho he is. Barnaby, my man, help 
me to put him in the chaise, and we’ll ride home to- 
gether.” 

“ I can’t touch him ! ” cried the idiot falling back, and 
shuddering as with a strong spasm ; “ he’s bloody ! ” 

“ It’s in his nature I know,” muttered the locksmith, 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


.53 


“ it’s cruel to ask him, but I must have help. Barnaby 
— good Barnaby — dear Barnaby — if you know this 
gentleman, for the sake of his life and everybody’s life 
that loves him, help me to raise him and lay him 
down.” 

“ Cover him then, wrap him close — don’t let me see 
it — smell it — hear the word. Don^t speak the word — 
don’t ! ” 

^ No, no, ril not. There, you see he’s covered now. 
Gently. Well done, well done ! ” 

They placed him in the carriage with great ease, for 
Barnaby was strong and active, but all the time they 
were so occupied he shivered from head to foot, and 
evidently experienced an ecstasy of terror. 

This accomplished, and the wounded man being 
covered with Varden’s own great-coat, which he took 
off for the purpose, they proceeded onward at a brisk 
pace : Barnaby gayly counting the stars upon his fingers, 
and Gabriel inwardly congratulating himself upon hav- 
ing an adventure now, which would silence Mrs. Varden 
on the subject of the Maypole, for that night, or there 
was no faith in woman. 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


. 54 


CHAPTER IV. 

In the venerable suburb — it was a suburb once — of 
Clerkenwell, towards that part of its confines which is 
nearest to the Charter House, and in one of those cool, 
shady streets, of which a few, widely scattered and dis- 
persed, yet remain in such old parts of the metropolis, 
— each tenement quietly vegetating like an ancient citi- 
zen who long ago retired from business, and dozing on in 
its infirmity until in course of time it tumbles down, and 
is replaced by some extravagant young heir, flaunting in 
stucco and ornamental work, and all the vanities of mod- 
ern days, — in this quarter, and in a street of this de- 
scription, the business of the present chapter lies. 

At the time of which it treats, though only six-and- 
sixty years ago, a very large part of what is London 
now had no existence. Even in the brains of the wildest 
speculators, there had sprung up no long rows of streets 
connecting Highgate with Whitechapel, no assemblages 
of palaces in the swampy levels, nor little cities in the 
open fields. Although this part of town was then, as 
now, parcelled out in streets, and plentifully peopled, it 
wore a different aspect. There were gardens to many 
of the houses, and trees by the pavement side ; with an 
ftir of freshness breathing up and down, which in these 
days would be sought in vain. Fields were nigh at 
hand, through which the New River took its winding 
course, and where there was merry haymaking in the 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


55 


Bummer time. Nature was not so far removed, or hard 
to get at, as in these days ; and although there were 
busy trades in Clerkenwell, and working jewellers by 
scores, it was a purer place, with farm-houses nearer to 
it than many modern Londoners would readily believe, 
and lovers’ walks at no great distance, which turned into 
squalid courts, long before the lovers of this age were 
bom, or, as the phrase goes, thought of. 

In one of these streets, the cleanest of them all, and 
on the shady side of the way — for good housewives 
know that sunlight damages their cherished furniture, 
and so choose the shade rather than its intrusive glare — 
there stood the house with which we have to deal. It 
was a modest building, not very straight, not large, not 
tall ; not bold-faced, with great staring windows, but a 
shy blinking house, with a conical roof going up into a 
peak over its garret window of four small panes of glass, 
like^a cocked hat on the head of an elderly gentleman 
with one eye. It was not built of brick or lofty stone, 
but of wood and plaster ; it was not planned with a dull 
and wearisome regard to regularity, for no one window 
matched the other, or seemed to have the slightest refer- 
ence to anything besides itself. 

The shop — for it had a shop — was, with 'reference 
to the first floor, where shops usually are ; and there 
all resemblance between it and any other shop stopped 
short and ceased. People who went in and out didn’6 
go up a flight of steps to it, or walk easily in upon 
a level with the street, but dived down three steep 
stairs, as into a cellar. Its floor Avas paved with stone 
and brick, as that of any other cellar might be; and 
in lieu of window framed and glazed it had a great 
black wooden flap or shutter, nearly breast high from 


56 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


the ground, which turned back in the daytime, ad- 
mitting as much cold air as light, and very often more. 
Behind this shop was a wainscoted parlor, looking 
first into a paved yard, and beyond that again into a 
little terrace garden raised some feet above it. Any 
stranger would have supposed that this wainscoted par- 
lor, saving for the door of communication by which 
he had entered, was cut off and detached from all the 
world ; and indeed most strangers on their first en- 
trance were observed to grow extremely thoughtful, 
as weighing and pondering in their minds whether the 
upper rooms were only approachable by ladders from 
without ; never suspecting that two of the most unas- 
suming and unlikely doors in existence, which the 
most ingenious mechanician on earth must of necessity 
have supposed to be the doors of closets, opened out 
of this room — each without tlie smallest preparation, 
or so much as a quarter of an inch of passage — upon 
two dark winding flights of stairs, the one upward, the 
other downward, which were the sole means of com- 
munication between that chamber and the other por- 
tions of the house. 

With all these oddities, there was not a neater, 
more scrupulously tidy, or more punctiliously ordered 
house, in Clerkenwell, in London, in all England. 
There were not cleaner windows, or whiter floors, or 
brighter stoves, or more highly shining articles of fur- 
liture in old mahogany ; there was not more rubbing, 
scrubbing, burnishing, and polishing, in the whole street 
put together. Nor was this excellence attained with- 
out some cost and trouble and great expenditure of 
voice, as the neighbors w^ere frequently reminded when 
the good lady of the house overlooked and assisted in 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


57 


its being put to rights on cleaning days — which were 
usually from Monday morning till Saturday night, both 
days inclusive. 

Leaning against the door-post of this, his dwelling, 
the locksmith stood early on the morning after he had 
met with the wounded man, gazing disconsolately at a 
great wooden emblem of a key, painted in vivid yel 
low to resemble gold, which dangled from the house- 
front, and swung to and fro with a mournful creaking 
noise, as if complaining that it had nothing to unlock. 
Sometimes, he looked over his shoulder into the shop, 
which was so dark and dingy with numerous tokens 
of his trade, and so blackened by the smoke of a lit- 
tle forge, near which his ’prentice was at work, that 
it would have been difficult for one unused to such 
espials to have distinguished anything but various tools 
of uncouth make and shape, great bunches of rusty 
keys, fragments of iron, half-finished locks, and such 
like things, which garnished the walls and hung in 
clusters from the ceiling. 

After a long and patient contemplation of the golden 
key, and many such backw'ard glances, Gabriel stepped 
into the road, and stole a look at the upper windows. 
One of them chanced to be thrown open at the mo- 
ment, and a roguish face met his ; a face lighted up 
by the loveliest pair of sparkling eyes that ever lock- 
smith looked upon ; the face of a pretty, laughing girl 
dimpled and fresh, and healthful — the very imperso- 
nation of good-humor and blooming beauty. 

“ Hush ! ” she whispered, bending forward and point- 
ing archly to the window underneath. “ Mother is 
still asleep.” 

“ Still, my dear,” returned the locksmith in the same 


58 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


tone. “ You talk as if she had been asleep all night, 
instead of little more than half an hour. But Fm 
very thankful. Sleep’s a blessing — no doubt about 
it.” The last few words he muttered to himself. 

“ How cruel of you to keep us up so late this 
morning, and never tell us where you were, or send 
us word ! ” said the girl. 

“ Ah Dolly, Dolly ! ” returned the locksmith, shak- 
ing his head, and smiling, “ how cruel of you to run 
up-stairs to bed ! Come down to breakfast, madcap, 
and come down lightly, or you’ll wake your mother. 
She must be tired, I am sure — I am.” 

Keeping these latter words to himself, and returning 
his daughter’s nod, he was passing into the workshop, 
with the smile she had awakened still beaming on his 
face, when he just caught sight of his ’prentice’s brown 
paper cap ducking down to avoid observation, and 
shrinking from the window back to its former place, 
which * the wearer no sooner reached than he began 
to hammer lustily. 

Listening again, Simon ! ” said Gabriel to himself. 
“That’s bad. What in the name of wonder does he 
expect the girl to say, that I always catch him listen- 
ing when she speaks, and never at any other time ! 
A bad habit, Sim, a sneaking, underhanded way. Ah 
you may hammer, but you won’t beat that out of me, 
if you work at it till your time’s up ! ” 

So saying, and shaking his head gravely, he reen- 
tered the workshop, and confronted the subject of these 
remarks. 

“There’s enough of that just now,” said the lock- 
smith. “You needn’t make any more of that con- 
founded clatter. Breakfast’s ready.” 


BARNABY KUDGE. 


59 


“ Sir,” said Sim, looking up Avith amazing politeness, 
and a peculiar little bow cut short off at the neck. 
‘‘ I shall attend you immediately.” 

“ I suppose,” muttered Gabriel, “ that’s out of the 
’Prentice’s Garland, or the ’Prentice’s Delight, or the 
’Prentice’s Warbler, or the ’Prentice’s Guide to the 
Gallows, or some such improving text-book. Now he’s 
going to beautify himself — here’s a precious lock- 
smith ! ” 

Quite unconscious that his master was looking on 
from'* the dark corner by the parlor door, Sim threw 
off the paper cap, sprang from his seat, and in two 
extraordinary steps, something between skating and 
minuet dancing, bounded to a washing place at the 
other end of the shop, and there removed from his 
face and hands all traces of his previous work — prac- 
tising the same step all the time with the utmost grav- 
ity. This done, he drew from some concealed place 
a little scrap of looking-glass, and with its assistance 
arranged his hair, and ascertained the exact state of a 
little carbuncle on his nose. Having now completed 
his toilet, he placed the fragment of mirror on a low 
bench, and looked over his shoulder at so much of, 
his legs as could be reflected in that small compass, 
with the greatest possible complacency and satisfac- 
tion. 

Sim, as he was called in the locksmith’s family, or 
Mr. Simon Tappertit, as he called himself, and re- 
.juired all men to style him out of doors, on holidays, 
And Sundays out, — was an old-fashioned, thin-faced, 
sleek-haired, sharp-nosed, small-eyed little fellow, very 
little more than five feet high, and thoroughly con- 
vinced in his own mind that he was above the middle 


60 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Bize ; rather tall, in fact, than otherwise. Of his fig- 
ure, which was Avell enough formed, though somewhat 
of the leanest, he entertained the highest admiration; 
and with his legs, which, in knee-breeches, were per- 
fect curiosities of littleness, he was enraptured to a 
degree amounting to enthusiasm. He also had some 
majestic, shadowy ideas, which had never been quite 
fathomed by his intimate friends, concerning the power 
of his eye. Indeed he had been known to go so far 
as to boast that he could utterly quell and subdue the 
haughtiest beauty by a simple process, which he termed 
“eying her over;” but it must be added, that neither 
of this faculty, nor of the power he claimed to have, 
through the same gift, of vanquishing and heaving 
down dumb animals, even in a rabid state, had he 
ever furnished evidence which could be deemed quite 
satisfactory and conclusive. 

It may be inferred from these premises, that in the 
small body of Mr. Tappertit there was locked up an 
ambitious and aspiring soul. As certain liquors, con- 
fined in casks too cramped in their dimensions, will 
ferment, and fret, and chafe in their imprisonment, so 
^the spiritual essence or soul of Mr. Tappertit would 
sometimes fume within that precious cask, his body, 
until, with great foam and froth and splutter, it would 
force a vent, and carry all before it. It was his cus- 
tom to remark, in reference to any one of these occa- 
sions, that his soul had got into his head ; and in this 
novel kind of intoxication, many scrapes and mishaps 
oefell him, which he had frequently concealed with no 
small difficulty from his worthy master. 

Sim Tappertit, among the other fancies upon which 
his before-mentioned soul was forever feasting and re- 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


61 


galing itself (and which fancies, like the liver of Pro- 
metheus, grew as they were fed upon), had a mighty 
notion of his order ; and had been heard by the ser- 
vant-maid openly expressing his regret that the ’pren- 
tices no longer carried clubs wherewith to mace the 
citizens : that was his strong expression. He was like- 
wise reported to have said that in former times a 
stigma had been cast upon the body by the execution 
of George Barnwell, to which they should not have 
basely submitted, but should have demanded him of 
the legislature — temperately at first ; then by an ap- 
peal to arms, if necessary — to be dealt with, as they 
in their wisdom might think fit. These thoughts always 
led him to consider what a glorious engine the ’pren- 
tices might yet become if they had but a master spirit 
at their head; and then he w^ould darkly, and to the 
terror of his hearers, hint at certain reckless fellows 
that he knew of, and at a certain Lion Heart ready 
to become their captain, who, once afoot, would make 
the Lord Mayor tremble on his throne. 

In respect of dress and personal decoration, Sim Tap- 
pertit was no less of an adventurous and enterprising 
character. He had been seen beyond dispute to pull off 
ruflles of the finest quality at the corner of the street on 
Sunday niglits, and to put them carefully in his pocket 
before returning home ; and it was quite notorious that 
on all great holiday occasions it was his habit to ex- 
change his plain steel knee-buckles for a pair of glitter- 
ing paste, under cover of a friendly post, planted most 
conveniently in that same spot. Add to this, that he 
was in years just twenty, in his looks much older, and in 
conceit at least two hundred ; that he had no objection to 
be jested with, touching his admiration of his master’s 


62 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


daughter ; and had even, when called upon at a certain 
obscure tavern to pledge the lady whom he honored 
with his love, toasted with many winks and leers, a 
fair creature whose Christian name, he said, began with 
a D — ; — and as much is known of Sim Tappertit, who 
lias by this time followed the locksmith in to break 
fast, as is necessary to be known in making his acquaint- 
ance. 

It was a substantial meal ; for, over and above the 
ordinary tea equipage, the board creaked beneath the 
weight of a jolly round of beef, a ham of the first mag- 
nitude, and sundry towers of buttered Yorkshire cake, 
piled slice upon slice in most alluring order. There was 
also a goodly jug of well-browned clay, fashioned into 
the form of an old gentleman, not by any means unlike 
the locksmith, atop of whose bald head was a fine white 
froth answering to his wig, indicative, beyond dispute, 
of sparkling home-brewed ale. But, better far than 
fair home-brewed, or Yorkshire cake, or ham, or beef, 
or anything to eat or drink that earth or air or water 
can supply, there sat, presiding over all, the locksmith’s 
rosy daughter, before whose dark eyes even beef grew 
insignificant, and malt became as nothing. 

Fathers should never kiss their daughters when young 
men are by. It’s too much. There are bounds to 
human endurance. So thought Sim Tappertit when 
Gabriel drew those rosy lips to his — those lips within 
Sim’s reach from day to day, and yet so far off. He 
had a respect for his master, but he wished the York- 
shire cake might choke him. 

Father,” said the locksmith’s daughter, when this 
salute was over, and they took their seats at table, “ what 
is this I hear about last night ? ” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


63 


“ All true, my dear ; true as the Gospel, Doll.” 

“ Young Mr. Chester robbed, and lying wounded in 
the road, when you came up ? ” 

“ Ay — Mr. Edward. And beside him, Barnaby call- 
ing for help with all his might. It was well it hap- 
pened as it did ; for the road’s a lonely one, the houi 
was late, and, the night being cold, and poor Barnaby 
even less sensible than usual from surprise and fright, 
the young gentleman might have met his death in a very 
short time.” 

“ I dread to think of it ! ” cried his daughter with a 
shudder. “ How did you know him ? ” 

“Know him!” returned the locksmith. “I didn’t 
know him — how could I ? I had never seen him, often 
as I had heard and spoken of him. I took him to Mrs. 
Rudge’s; and she no sooner saw him than the truth 
came out.” 

“Miss Emma, father — If this news should reach 
her, enlarged upon as it is sure to be, she will go dis- 
tracted.” 

“ Why, lookye there again, how a man suffers for 
being good-natured,” said the locksmith. “ Miss Emma 
was with her uncle at the masquerade at Carlisle House, 
where she had gone, as the people at the Warren told 
me, sorely against her will. What does your blockhead 
father when he and Mrs. Rudge have laid their heads 
together, but goes there when he ought to be abed, 
makes interest with his friend the door-keeper, slips 
him on a mask and domino, and mixes with the 
maskers.” 

“ And like himself to do so I ” cried the girl, putting 
her fair arm round his neck, and giving him a most en- 
thusiastic kiss. 


64 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ Like himself ! ” repeated Gabriel, affecting to grum- 
ble, but evidently delighted with the part he had taken, 
and with her praise. “ Very like himself — so your 
mother said. However, vhe mingled with the crowd, and 
prettily worried and badgered he was, I warrant you, 
with people squeaking, ‘ Don’t you know me.^ ’ and ‘ I’ve 
found you out,’ and all that kind of nonsense in his ears. 
He might have wandered on till now, but in a little room 
there was a young lady who had taken off her mask, on 
account of the place being very warm, and was sitting 
there alone.” 

“And that was she?” said his daughter hastily. 

“ And that was she,” replied the locksmith ; “ and I 
no sooner whispered to her what the matter was — as 
softly, Doll, and with nearly as much art as you could 
have used yourself — than she gives a kind of scream 
and faints away.” 

“ What did you do — what happened next ? ” asked 
his daughter. 

“ Why, the masks came flocking round, with a gen- 
eral noise and hubbub, and I thought myself in luck to 
get clear off, that’s all,” rejoined the locksmith. “ What 
happened when I reached home you may guess, if you 
didn’t hear it. Ah ! Well, it’s a poor heart that never 
rejoices. — Put Toby this way, my dear.” 

This Toby was the brown jug of which previous men- 
tion has been made. Applying his lips to the ;Worthy 
old gentleman’s benevolent forehead, the locksmith, who 
had all this time been ravaging among the eatables, kept 
them there so long, at the same time raising the ves- 
sel slowly in the air, that at length Toby stood on his 
head upon his nose, when he smacked his lips and set 
him on the table again with fond reluctance. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


65 


Although Sim Tappertit had taken no share in this 
conversation, no part of it being addressed to him, he 
had not been wanting in such silent manifestations of 
astonishment, as he deemed most compatible with the 
favorable display of his eyes. Regarding the pause 
which now ensued, as a particularly advantageous op- 
portunity for doing great execution with them upon the 
locksmith’s daughter (who he had no doubt was looking 
at him in mute admiration), he began to screw and 
twist his face, and especially those features, into such 
extraordinary, hideous, and unparalleled contortions, that 
Gabriel, who happened to look towards him, was stricken 
with amazement. 

“ Why, what the devil’s the matter with the lad ? ” 
cried the locksmith. “Is he choking?” 

“ Who ? ” demanded Sim, with somiB disdain. 

“ Who ? why, you,” returned his master. “ What do 
you mean by making those horrible faces over your 
breakfast ? ” 

“ Faces are matters of taste, sir,” said Mr. Tappertit, 
rather discomfited ; not the less so because he saw the 
locksmith’s daughter smiling. 

“ Sim,” rejoined Gabriel, laughing heartily. “ Don’t 
be a fool, for I’d rather see you in your senses. These 
young fellows,” he added, turning to his daughter, “ are 
always committing some folly or another. There was 
a quarrel between Joe Willet and old John last nighl 
— though I can’t say Joe was much in fault either. 
He’ll be missing one of these mornings, and will have 
gone away upon some wild-goose errand, seeking his 
fortune. — Why, what’s the matter, Doll ? Tou are 
making faces now. The girls are as bad as the boys 
every bit ! ” 

VOL. I. 


5 


66 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“It’s the tea,” said Dolly, turning alternately very 
red and very white, which is no doubt the effect of a 
slight scald — “ so very hot.” 

Mr. Tappertit looked immensely big at a quartern 
loaf on the table, and breathed hard. 

“ Is that all ? ” returned the locksmith. “ Put some 
wore milk in it. — Yes, I am sorry for Joe, because he 
is a likely young fellow, and gains upon one every time 
one sees him. But he’ll start off, you’ll find. Indeed 
he told me as much himself! ” 

“ Indeed ! ” cried Dolly in a faint voice. “ In — deed ! ” 
“ Is the tea tickling your throat still, my dear ? ” said 
the locksmith. 

But, before his daughter could make him any answer, 
she was taken with a troublesome cough, and it was such 
a very unpleasant cough that, when she left off, the tears 
were starting in her bright eyes. The good-natured 
locksmith was still patting her on the back and apply- 
ing such gentle restoratives, when a message arrived 
from Mrs. Varden, making known to all whom it might 
concern, that she felt too much indisposed to rise after 
her great agitation and anxiety of the previous night ; 
and therefore desired to be immediately accommodated 
with the little black teapot of strong* mixed tea, a couple 
of rounds of buttered toast, a middling-sized dish of beef 
and ham cut thin, and the Protestant Manual in two 
volumes, post octavo. Like some other ladies who in 
remote ages flourished upon this globe, Mrs. Varden was 
most devout when most ill-tempered. Whenever she 
and her husband were at unusual variance, then the 
Protestant Manual was in high feather. 

Knowing from • experience what these requests por- 
r^ended, the triumvirate broke up ; Dolly, to see the 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


C7 


orders executed with all despatch ; Gabriel, to some out- 
of-door work in his little chaise ; and Sim, to his daily 
duty in the workshop, to which retreat he carried the 
big look, although the loaf remained behind. 

Indeed the big look increased immensely, and when 
he had tied his apron on, became quite gigantic. It was 
not until he had several times walked up and down with 
folded arms, and the longest strides he could take, and 
had kicked a great many small articles out of his way, 
that his lip began to curl. At length, a gloomy derision 
came upon his features, and he smiled ; uttering mean- 
while with supreme contempt the monosyllable “ Joe ! ” 

* “ I eyed her over, while he talked about the fellow,” 
he said, “ and that was of course the reason of her being 
confused. Joe ! ” 

He walked up and down again much quicker than be- 
fore, and if possible with longer strides ; sometimes stop- 
ping to take a glance at his legs, and sometimes to jerk 
out and cast from him, another “ Joe ! ” In the course 
of a quarter of an hour or so he again assumed the 
paper cap and tried to work. No. It could not be done. 

“ I’ll do nothing to-day,” said Mr. Tappertit, dashing 
it down again, “ but grind. I’ll grind up all the tools. 
Grinding will suit my present humor well. Joe ! ” 

Whirr-r-r-r. The gi’indstone was soon in motion ; 
the sparks were flying off in showers. This was the 
occupation for his heated spirit. 

W hirr-r-r-r-r-r-r. 

“ Something will come of this ! ” said Mr. Tappertit, 
pausing as if in triumph, and wiping his heated face 
upon his sleeve. “ Something will come of this. I 
hope it mayn’t be human gore ! ” 

W h i rr-r-r-r-r-r-r . 


68 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


CHAPTER V. 

As soon as the business of the day was over, the lock- 
smith sallied forth, alone, to visit the wounded gentleman 
and ascertain the progress of his recovery. The house 
where he had left him was in a by-street in Southwark, 
not far from London Bridge ; and thither he hied with 
all speed, bent upon returning with as little delay as 
might be, and getting to bed betimes. 

Tlie evening was boisterous — scarcely better than 
the previous night had been. It was not easy for a 
stout man like Gabriel to keep his legs at the street 
corners, or to make head against the high wind, which 
often fairly got the better of him and drove him back 
some paces, or, in defiance of all his energy, forced him 
to take shelter in an arch or door-way until the fury of 
the gust was spent. Occasionally a hat or wig, or both, 
came spinning and trundling past him, like a mad thing ; 
while the more serious spectacle of falling tiles and slates, 
or of masses of brick and mortar or fragments of stone- 
coping rattling upon the pavement near at hand, and 
splitting into fragments, did not increase the pleasure of 
Uie journey, or make the way less dreary. 

“ A trying night for a man like me to walk in ! ” 
said the locksmith, as he knocked softly at the widow’s 
door. “I’d rather be in old John’s chimney-corner, 
faith!” 

“ Who’s there ? ” demanded a woman’s voice from 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


69 


within. Being answered, it added a hasty word of wel- 
come, and the door was quickly opened. 

She was about forty — perhaps two or three years 
older — with a cheerful aspect, and a face that had once 
been pretty.. It bore traces of aflBiiction and care, but 
they were of an old date, and Time had smoothed them. 
Any one who had bestowed but a casual glance on Bar- 
naby might have known that this was his mother, from 
the strong resemblance between them ; but where in his 
face there was wildness and vacancy, in hers there was 
the patient composure of long effort and quiet resignation. 

One thing about this face was very strange and start- 
ling. You could not look upon it in its most cheerful 
mood without feeling that it had some extraordinary 
capacity of expressing terror. It was not on the surface. 
It was in no one feature that it lingered. You could not 
take the eyes, or mouth, or lines upon the cheek, and 
say if this or that were otherwise, it would not be so. 
Yet there it always lurked — something forever dimly 
seen, but ever there, and never absent for a moment. It 
was the faintest, palest shadow of some look, to which an 
instant of intense and most unutterable horror only could 
have given birth ; but indistinct and feeble as it was, it 
did suggest what that look must have been, and fixed it 
in the mind as if it had had existence in a dream. 

More faintly imaged, and wanting force and purpose, 
as it were, because of his darkened intellect, there was 
this same stamp upon the son. Seen in a picture, it 
must have had some legend with it, and would have 
haunted those who looked upon the canvas. They who 
tnew the Maypole story, and could remember what the 
widow was, before her husband’s and his master’s murder, 
understood it well. They recollected how the change 


70 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


had come, and could call to mind that when her son was 
born, upon the very day the deed was known, he bore 
upon his wrist what seemed a smear of blood but half 
washed out. 

“ God save you, neighbor ! ” said the locksmith, as he 
followed her with the air of an old friend, into a little 
parlor where a cheerful fire was burning. 

“ And you,” she answered, smiling. “ Your kind 
heart has brought you here again. Nothing will keep 
you at home, I know of old, if there are friends to serve 
or comfort, out of doors.” 

“ Tut, tut,” returned the locksmith, rubbing his hands 
and warming them. “ You women are such talkers. 
What of the patient, neighbor?” 

“ He is sleeping now. He was very restless towards 
daylight, and for some hours -tossed and tumbled sadly. 
But the fever has left him, and the doctor says he will 
soon mend. He must not be removed until to-morrow.” 

“ He has had visitors to-day — humph ? ” said Gabriel, 

siyiy* 

“ Yes. Old Mr. Chester has been here ever since we 
sent for him, and had not been gone many minutes when 
you knocked.” 

“ No ladies ? ” said Gabriel, elevating his eyebrows 
and looking disappointed. 

A letter,” replied the widow. 

“ Come. That’s better than nothing ! ” cried the lock 
smith. “ Who was the bearer ? ” 

“ Barnaby, of course.” 

“ Barnaby’s a jewel ! ” said Varden ; “ and comes and 
goes with ease where we who think ourselves much wiser 
would make but a poor hand of it. He is not out wan- 
dering again, I hope ? ” 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


71 


‘‘ Thank Heaven he is in his bed ; having been up 
all night, 'as you know, and on his feet all day. He 
was quite tired out. Ah, neighbor, if I could but see 
him oftener so — if I could but tame down that terrible 
restlessness ” 

“ In good time,’^ said the locksmith, kindly, “ in good 
time — don’t be down-hearted. To my mind he grows 
wiser every day.” 

The widow shook her head. And yet, though she 
knew the locksmith sought to cheer her, and spoke from 
no conviction of his own, she was glad to hear even this 
praise of her poor benighted son. 

“ He will be a ’cute man yet,” resumed the locksmith. 
“ Take care, when we are growing old and foolish, Bur- 
naby doesn’t put us to the blush, that’s all. But our 
other friend,” he added, looking under the table and 
about the floor — “sharpest and cunningest of all the 
sharp and cunning ones — where’s he ? ” 

“ In Barnaby’s room,” rejoined the widow, with a 
faint smile. 

“ Ah I He’s a knowing blade ! ” said Varden, shak- 
ing his head. “ I should be sorry to talk secrets before 
him. Oh ! He’s a deep customer, I’ve no doubt he can 
read, and write, and cast accounts if he chooses. What 
was that — him tapping at the door ? ” 

“ No,” returned the widow. “ It was in the street, I 
think. Hark ! Yes. There again ! ’Tis some one 
knocking softly at the shutter. Who can it be ! ” 

They had been speaking in a low tone, for the invalid 
'ay overhead, and the walls and ceilings being thin and 
Doorly built, the sound of their voices might otherwise 
have disturbed his slumber. The party without, who- 
ever it was, could have stood close to the shutter with- 


72 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


out hearing anything spoken ; and, seeing the light 
through the chinks and finding all so quiet, might have 
been persuaded that only one person was there. 

Some thief or ruffian, may be,” said the locksmith. 
“ Give me the light.” * 

“ No, no,” she returned hastily. “ Such visitors have 
never come to this poor dwelling. Do you stay here. 
Youh’e within call, at the worst. I would rather go 
myself — alone.” 

“ Why ? ” said the locksmith, unwillingly relinqiiish- 
ing the candle he had caught up from the table. 

“ Because — I don't know why — because the wish 
is strong upon me,” she rejoined. “ There again — do 
not detain me, I beg of you ! ” 

Gabriel looked at her, in great surprise to see one 
who was usually so mild and quiet thus agitated, and 
with so little cause. She left the room and closed the 
door behind her. She stood for a moment as if hesitat- 
ing, with her hand upon the lock. In this short interval 
the knocking came again, and a voice close to the win- 
dow — a voice the locksmith seemed to recollect, and to 
have some disagreeable association with — whispered 
“Make haste.” 

The words were uttered in that low distinct voice 
which finds its way so readily to sleepers* ears, and 
wakes them in a fright. For a moment it startled even 
the locksmith ; who involuntarily drew back from the 
window, and listened. 

The wind rumbling in the chimney made it difficult 
to hear what passed, but he could tell that the door was 
opened, that there was the tread of a man upon the 
creaking boards, and then a moment’s silence — broken 
by a suppressed something which was not a shriek, or 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


73 


groan, or cry for help, and yet might have been either 
or all three ; and the words “ My God ! ” uttered in a 
voice it chilled him to hear. 

He rushed out upon the instant. There, at last, was 
that dreadful look — the very one he seemed to know 
so well and yet had never seen before — upon her face. 
There, she stood, frozen to the ground, gazing with start- 
ing eyes, and livid cheeks, and every feature fixed aiid' 
ghastly, upon the man he had encountered in the dark 
last night. His eyes met those of the locksmith. It 
was but a flash, an instant, a breath p)on a polished 
glass, and he was gone. 

The locksmith was upon him — had the skirts of his 
streaming garment almost in his grasp — when his arms 
w’ere tightly clutched, and the widow flung herself upon 
the ground before him. 

“ The other way — the other way,” she cried. “ He 
went the other way. Turn — turn ! ” 

“ The other way ! I see him now,” rejoined the 
locksmith, pointing — “ yonder — there — there is his 
shadow passing by that light. What — who is this ? 
Let me go.” 

“ Come back, come back ! ” exclaimed the woman, 
clasping him ; “ Do not touch him on your life. I 
charge you, come back. He carries other lives besides 
his own. Come back!” 

“ What does this mean ? ” cried the locksmith. 

“ No matter what it means, don’t ask, don’t speak, 
don’t think about it. He is not to be followed, checked, 
or stopped. Come back ! ” 

The old man looked at her in wonder, as she writhed 
and clung about him ; and, borne down by her passion. 
Buffered her to drag him into the house. It was not 


74 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


until she had chained and double-locked the door, fas- 
tened every bolt and bar with the heat and fury of a 
maniac, and drawn him back into^the room, that she 
turned upon him, once again, that stony look of horror, 
and sinking down into a chair, covered her face, and 
shuddered, as though the hand of death were on her. 



*0 ' 


Tail* C. . y.'i ■ J ''i oi* 

:k' iiii ’ 


BARNABY KUDGE. 


75 


CHAPTER VI. 

Beyond all measure astonished by the strange oc- 
currences which had passed with so much violence and 
rapidity, the locksmith gazed upon the shuddering figure 
in the chair like one half stupefied, and would have 
gazed much longer, had not his tongue been loosened 
by compassion and humanity. 

“ You are ill,” said Gabriel. “ Let me call some 
neighbor in.” 

“ Not for the world,” she rejoined, motioning to him 
with her trembling hand, and still holding her face 
averted. “It is enough that you have been by, to see 
this.” 

“ Nay, more than enough — or less," said Gabriel. 

“ Be it so,” she returned. “ As you like. Ask me 
no questions, I entreat you.” 

“ Neighbor,” said the locksmith after a pause. “ Is 
this fair or reasonable, or just to yourself? Is it like 
you, who have known me so long and sought my advice 
in all matters — like you, who from a girl have had a 
strong mind and a stanch heart?” 

“I have had need of them,” she replied. “I am 
growing old, both in years and care. Perhaps that, and 
too much trial, have made them weaker than they used 
to be. Do not speak to me.” 

“How can I see what I have seen, and hold my 
peace ! ” returned the locksmith. “ Who was that 


76 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


man, and why has his coming made this change in 
you ? ” 

She was silent, but held to the chair as though to 
save herself from falling on the ground. 

“ I take the license of an old acquaintance, Mary,” 
said the locksmith, “ who has ever had a warm regard 
for you, and maybe has tried to prove it when he 
could. Who is this ill-favored man, and what has he 
to do with you ? Who is this ghost, that is only seen 
in the black nights and bad weather? How does he 
know, and why does he haunt, this house, whispering 
through chinks and crevices, as if there was that be- 
tween him and you, which neither durst so much as 
speak aloud of? Who is he?” 

“ You do well to say he haunts this house,” returned 
the widow, faintly. “ His shadow has been upon it 
and me, in light and darkness, at noonday and mid- 
night. And now, at last, he has come in the body ! ” 

“ But he wouldn’t have gone in the body,” returned 
the locksmith with some irritation, “ if you had left my 
arms and legs at liberty. What riddle is it ? ” 

“ It is one,” she answered, rising as she spoke, “ that 
must remain forever as it is. I dare not say more 
than that.” 

“ Dare not ! ” repeated the wondering locksmith. 

“ Do not press me,” she replied. “ I am sick and 
faint, and every faculty of life seems dead within me. 
— No ! — Do not touch me, either.” 

Gabriel, who had stepped forward to render her as- 
sistance, fell back as she made this hasty exclamation, 
^nd regarded her in silent wonder. 

“ Let me go my way alone,” she said in a low voice, 
“ and let the hands of no honest man touch mine to- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


77 


night.” When she had tottered to the door, she turned, 
and added with a stronger effort, This is a secret, 
which, of necessity, I trust to you. You are a true 
man. As you have ever been good and kind to me, 

■ — keep it. If any noise was heard above, make some- 
excuse — say anything but what you reajly saw, and 
never let a word or look between us, recall this cir-' 
cumstance. I trust to you. Mind, I trust to you. 
How much I trust, you never can conceive.” 

Casting her eyes upon him for an instant, she with- 
drew, and left him there alone. 

Gabriel, not knowing what to think, stood staring 
at the door with a countenance full of surprise and 
dismay. The more he pondered on what had passed, 
the less able he was to give it any favorable inter- 
pretation. To find this widow woman, whose life for 
so many years had been supposed to be one of soli- 
tude and retirement, and who, in her quiet suffering 
character, had gained the good opinion and respect of 
all who knew her — to find her linked mysteriously 
with an ill-omened man, alarmed at his appearance, 
and yet favoring his escape, was a discovery that 
pained as much as it startled him. Her reliance on 
his secrecy, and his tacit acquiescence, increased his 
• distress of mind. If he had spoken boldly, persisted 
in questioning her, detained her when she rose to 
leave the room, made any kind of protest, instead of 
silently compromising himself, as he felt he had done, 
he would have been more at ease. 

“ Why did I let her say it was a secret, and she 
trusted it to me ! ” said Gabriel, putting his wig on 
one side to scratch his head with greater ease, and 
looking ruefully at the fire. “I have no more readi- 


78 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


ness than old John himself. Why didn’t I say firmly, 
You have no right to such secrets, and I demand 
of you to tell me what this means,’ instead of stand- 
ing gaping at her, like an old mooncalf as I am ! But 
there’s my weakness. I can be obstinate enough with 
len if need, be, but women may twist me round their 
angers at their pleasure.” 

He took his wig off outright as he made this reflec- 
tion, and, warming his handkerchief at the fire began 
to rub and polish his bald head with it, until it glis- 
tened again. 

“ And yet,” said the locksmith, softening under this 
soothing process, and stopping to smile, “it may be 
nothing. Any drunken brawler trying to make his 
way into the house, would have alarmed a quiet soul 
like her. But then ” — and here was the vexation — 
“ how came it to be that man ; how comes he to have 
this influence over her; how came she to favor his 
getting away from me ; and, more than all, how came 
she not to say it was a sudden fright, and nothing 
more? It’s a sad thing to have, in one minute, rea- 
son to mistrust a person I have known so long, and 
an old sw^eetheart into the bargain: but what else can 
I do, with all this upon my mind! — Is that Barnaby 
outside there?” 

“ Ay ! ” he cried, looking in and nodding. “ Sure 
snough it’s Barnaby — how did you guess ? ” 

“ By your shadow,” said the locksmith. 

“ Oho 1 ” cried Barnaby, glancing over his shoulder, 
* He’s a merry fellow, that shadow, and keeps close 
to me, though I am silly. We have such pranks, such 
walks, such runs, such gambols on the grass ! Some- 
times he’ll be half as tall as a church steeple, and 


BAENABY RUDGE. 


79 


sometimes no bigger than a dwarf. Now, he goes on 
before, and now behind, and anon he’ll be stealing 
slyly on, on this side, or on that, stopping whenever I 
stop, and thinking I can’t see him, though I have my 
eye on him sharp enough. Oh ! he’s a merry fellow. 
Tell me — is he silly too ! I think he is.” 

“ Why ? ” asked Gabriel. 

“ Because he never tires of mocking me, but does 
it all day long. — Why don’t you come ? ” 

“Where?” 

“ Up-stairs. He wants you. Stay — where’s Mi 
shadow ? Come. You’re a wise man ; tell me that.” 

“ Beside him, Barnaby ; beside him, I suppose,” re- 
turned the locksmith. • 

“ No ! ” he replied, shaking his head. “ Guess again ” 

“Gone out a- walking, maybe?” 

“ He has changed shadows v^th a woman,” the idiot 
whispered in his ear, and then fell back wnth a look 
of triumph. “ Her shadow’s always with him, and his 
with her. That’s sport I think, eh?” 

“ Barnaby,” said the locksmith, with a grave look ; 
“ come hither, lad.” 

“I know what you want to say. I know!” he re- 
plied, keeping away from him. “ But I’m cunning. 
I’m silent. I only say so much to you — are you 
ready ? ” As he spoke, he caught up the light, and 
waved it with a wild laugh above his head. 

“ Softly — gently,” said the locksmith, exerting all 
his influence to keep him calm and quiet. “I thought 
you had been asleep.” 

“ So I have been asleep,” he rejoined, with widely- 
opened eyes. “ There have been great faces coming 
and going — close to my face, and then a mile away 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


RO 

— low places to creep through, whether I would or 
no — high churches to fall down from — strange crea- 
tures crowded up together neck and heels, to sit upon 
the bed — that’s sleep, eh ? ” 

“ Dreams, Barnaby, dreams,” said the locksmith. 

“ Dreams ! ” he echoed softly, drawing closer to him. 

“ Those are not dreams.” 

“ What are,” replied the locksmith, “ if they are 
not?” 

“ I dreamed,” said Barnaby, passing his arm through 
Varden’s, and peering close into his face as he answered 
in a whisper, “ I dreamed just now that something — 
it was in the shape of a man — followed me — came 
softly after me — wouldn’t let me be — but was always 
hiding and crouching, like a cat in dark corners, wait- 
ing till I should pass ; when it crept out and came 
softly after me. — Did f^ou ever see me run ? ” 

“ Many a time, you know.” 

“ You never saw me run as I did in this dream. 
Still it came creeping on to worry me. Nearer, nearer, 
nearer — I ran faster — leaped — sprung out of bed, 
and to the window — and there, in the street below — 
but he is waiting for us. Are you coming?” 

“ What in the street below, Barnaby ? ” said Var- ' 
den, imagining that he traced some connection between 
this vision and what had actually occurred. 

Barnaby looked into his face, muttered incoherently, 
waved the light above his head again, laughed, and 
drawing the locksmith’s arm more tightly through his 
own, led him up the stairs in silence. 

They entered a homely bedchamber, garnished in 
a scanty way with chairs whose spindle-shanks bespoke 
their age, and other furniture of very little worth ; but 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


81 


clean and neatly kept. Reclining in an easy-chair 
before the fire, pale and weak from waste of blood, 
was Edward Chester, the young gentleman who had 
been the first to quit the Maypole on the previous 
night, and who, extending his hand to the locksmith, 
welcomed him as his preserver and friend. 

“ Say no more, sir, say no more,” said Gabriel. “ I 
hope I would -have done at least as much for any 
man in such a strait, and most of all for you, sir. 
A certain young lady,” he added, with some hesita- 
tion, “has done us many a kind turn, and we natu- 
rally feel — I hope I give you no offence in saying 
this, sir ? ” • 

The young man smiled and shook his head ; at the 
same time moving in his chair as if in pain. 

“ It’s no great matter,” he . said, in answer to the 
locksmith’s sympathizing look, “ a mere uneasiness 
arising at least as much from being cooped up here, 
as from the slight wound I have, or from the loss of 
blood. Be seated, Mr. Varden.” 

“ If I may make so bold, Mr. Edward, as to lean 
upon your chair,” returned the locksmith, accommodat- 
ing his action to his speech, and bending over him, 
“ I’ll stand here, for the convenience of speaking low. 
Barnaby is not in his quietest humor to-night, and at 
such times talking never does him good.” 

They both glanced at the subject of this remark, 
who had taken a seat on the other side of the fire, 
and, smiling vacantly, was making puzzles on his fin- 
gers with a skein of string. 

“ Pray, tell me, sir,” said Varden, dropping his voice 
«»till lower, “ exactly what happened last night. I have 
my reason for inquiring. You left the Maypole alone ? ” 

VOL. I. 6 


82 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


“ And walked homeward alone, until I had nearly 
reached the place where you found me, when I heard 
the gallop of a horse.” 

— “ Behind you ? ” said the locksmith. 

“ Indeed, yes — behind me. It was a single rider, 
who soon overtook me, and checking his horse, inquired 
the way to London.” 

“ You were on the alert, sir, knowing how many high- 
waymen there are, scouring the roads in all directions ? ” 
said Varden. 

“ I was, but I had only a stick, having imprudently 
left my pistols in their holster-case with the landlord’s 
son. I directed him as he desired. Before the words 
had passed my lips, he rode upon me furiously, as if 
bent on trampling me down beneath his horse’s hoofs. 
In starting aside, I slipped and fell. You found me with 
tlys stab and an ugly bruise or two, and without my 
purse — in which he found little enough for his pains. 
And now, Mr. Varden,” he added, shaking the locksmith 
by the hand, “ saving the extent of my gratitude to you, 
you know as much as I.” 

“ Except,” said Gabriel, bending down yet more, 
and looking cautiously towards their silent neighbor, 
“ except in respect of the robber himself. What like 
was he, sir? Speak low, if you please. Barnaby 
means no harm, but I have watched him oftener than 
you, and I know, little as you would think it, that he’s 
listening now.” 

It required a strong confidence in the locksmith’s ve- 
racity to lead any one to this belief, for every sense and 
faculty that Barnaby possessed, seemed to be fixed upon 
liis game, to the exclusion of all other things. Some- 
filing in the young man’s face expressed this opinion, 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


83 


for Gabriel repeated what he had just said, more ear- 
nestly than before, and with another glance towards Bar- 
naby, again asked what like the man was. 

“ The night was so dark,” said Edward, “ the attack 
so sudden, and he so wrapped and muffled up, that I can 
hardly say. It seems that ” — 

Don’t mention his name, sir,” returned the locksmith, 
following his look towards Barnaby ; ‘‘ I know he saw 
him. I want to know what you saw.” 

“ All T remember is,” said Edward, “ that as he 
checked his horse his hat was blown off. He caught it 
and replaced it on his head, which I observed was bound 
with a dark handkerchief. A stranger entered the May- 
pole while I was there, whom I had not seen — for I sat 
apart for reasons of my own — and when I rose to leave 
the room and glanced round, he was in the shadow of 
the’ chimney and hidden from my sight. But, if he and 
the robber were two different persons, their voices were 
strangely and most remarkably alike ; for directly the 
man addressed me in the road, I recognized his speech 
again.” 

“ It is as I feared. The very man was here to-night,” 
thought the locksmith, changing color. What dark his- 
tory is this ! ” 

“ Halloa ! ” cried a hoarse voice in his ear. “ Halloa, 
halloa, halloa ! Bow wow wow. What’s the matter 
here ! Hal-loa ! ” 

The speaker — who made the locksmith start, as if he 
had seen some supernatural agent — was a large raven, 
who had perched upon the top of the easy-chair, unseen 
by him and Edward, and listened with a polite attention 
and a most extraordinary appearance of comprehending 
every word, to all they had said up to this point ; turning 


84 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


his head from one to the other, as if his office were to 
judge between them, and it were of the very last -im- 
portance that he should not lose a word. 

“ Look at him ! ” said Varden, divided between admi- 
ration of the bird and a kind of fear of him. “ Was 
there ever such a knowing imp as that ! Oh he’s a 
dreadful fellow ! ” 

The raven, with his head very much on one side, and 
his bright eye shining like a diamond, preserved a 
thoughtful silence for a few seconds, and then replied 
in a voice so hoarse and distant, that it seemed to 
come through his thick feathers rather that out of his 
mouth. 

“ Halloa, halloa, halloa ! What’s the matter here ! 
Keep up your spirits. Never say die. Bow wow wow. 
I’m a devil, I’m a devil. I’m a devil. Hurrah ! ” — And 
then, as if exulting in his infernal character, he began to 
whistle. 

“ I more than half believe he speaks the truth. Upon 
my word, I do,” said Varden. “ Do you see how he 
looks at me, as if he knew what I was saying ? ” 

To which the bird, balancing himself on tiptoe, as it 
were, and moving his body up and down in a sort of 
grave dance, rejoined, “ I’m a devil. I’m a devil. I’m a 
devil,” and flapped his wings against his sides as if he 
were bursting with laughter. Barnaby clapped his 
hands, and fairly rolled upon the ground in an ecstasy 
of delight. 

“ Strange companions, sir,” said the locksmith, shaking 
his head and looking from one to the other. “ The bird 
Has all the wit.” 

“ Strange indeed ! ” said Edward, holding out his fore- 
flnger to the raven, who, in acknowledgment of the at- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


85 


tention made a dive at it immediate!^ with his iron bill 
“ Is he old ? ” 

“ A mere boy, sir,” replied the locksmith. “ A hun- 
dred and twenty, or thereabouts. Call him down, Bar- 
naby, my man.” 

“ Call him ! ” echoed Barnaby, sitting upright upon 
the floor, and staring vacantly at Gabriel, as he thrust 
his hair back from his face. “ But who can make him 
come ! He calls me, and makes me go where he will. 
He goes on before, and I follow. He’s the master, and 
I’m the man. Is that the truth. Grip ? ” 

The raven gave a short, comfortable, confidential kind 
of croak ; — a most expressive croak, which seemed to 
say, “ You needn’t let these fellows into our secrets. 
We understand each other. It’s all right.” 

“ I make him come ? ” cried Barnaby, pointing to the 
bird. “ Him, who never goes to sleep, or so much as 
winks ! — Why, any time of night, you may see his eyes 
in my dark room, shining like two sparks. And every 
night, and all night too, he’s broad awake, talking to 
himself, thinking what he shall do to-morrow, where we 
shall go, and what he shall steal, and hide, and bury. I 
make him come ! Ha, ha, ha ! ” 

On second thoughts, the bird appeared disposed to come 
of himself. After a short survey of the ground, and a 
few sidelong looks at the ceiling and at everybody pres- 
ent in turn, he fluttered to the floor, and went to Barnaby 
— • not in a hop, or walk, or run, but in a pace like that 
of a very particular gentleman with exceedingly tight 
ooots on, trying to walk fast over loose pebbles. Then, 
«»tepping into his extended hand, and condescending to be 
ueld out at arm’s length, he gave vent to a succession 
»f sounds, not unlike the drawing of some eight or ten 


86 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


dozen of long corks, and again asserted his brimstone 
birth and parentage with great distinctness. 

The locksmith shook his head — perhaps in some 
doubt of the creature’s being really* nothing but a bird — 
perhaps in pity for Barnaby, who by this time had him 
in his arms, and was rolling about, with him, on the 
ground. As he raised his eyes from the poor fellow he 
encountered those of his mother, who had entered the 
room, and was looking on in silence. 

She was quite white in the face, even to her lips, 
but had wholly subdued her emotion, and wore her 
usual quiet .look. Varden fancied, as he glanced at 
her that she shrunk from his eye ! and that she busied 
herself about the wounded gentleman to avoid him the 
better. 

It was time he went to bed, she said. He w^as to be 
removed to his own home on the morrowg and he had 
already exceeded his time for sitting up, by a full hour. 
Acting on this hint, the locksmith prepared to take his 
leave. 

“ By the by,” said Edward, as he shook him by the 
hand, and looked from him to Mrs. Budge and back 
again, “ what noise was that below ? I heard your voice 
in the midst of it, and should have inquired before, but 
our other conversation drove it from my memory. What 
was it ? ” • 

The locksmith looked towards her, and bit his lip. 
She leant against the chair, and bent her eyes upon the 
ground. Barnaby too — he was listening. 

— “ Some mad or drunken fellow, sir,” Varden at 
length made answer, looking steadily at the widow as he 
spoke. “ He mistook the house, and tried to force an 
entrance.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


87 


She breathed more freely, but stood quite motionless. 
As the locksmith said “ Good-night,” and Barnaby caught 
up the candle to light him down the stairs, she took it 
from him,, and charged him — with more haste and 
earnestness than so slight an occasion appeared to war- 
rant — not to stir. The raven followed them to satisfy 
himself that all was right below, and when they reached 
the street-door, stood on the bottom stair drawing corks 
out of number. 

With a trembling hand she unfastened the chain and 
bolts and turned the key. As she had her hand upon 
the latch, the locksmith said in a low voice, — 

“ I have told a lie to-night, for your sake, Mary, and 
for the sake of bygone times, and old acquaintance, when 
I would scorn to do so for my own. I hope T may have 
done no harm, or led to none. I can’t help the suspicions 
you have forced upon me, and I am loath, I tell you 
plainly, to leave Mr. Edward here. Take care he comes 
to no hurt. I doubt the safety of this roof, and am glad 
he leaves it so soon. Now, let me go.” 

For a moment she hid her face in lier hands and 
wept ; but resisting 4he strong impulse which evidently 
moved her to reply, opened the door — no wider than 
was sufficient for the passage of his body — and mo- 
tioned him away. As the locksmith stood upon the 
step, it was chained and locked behind him, and the 
raven, in furtherance of these precautions, barked like 
a lusty house-dog. 

“ In league with that ill-looking figure that might 
have fallen from a gibbet — he listening and hiding 
here — Barnaby first upon the spot last night — can 
she who has always borne so fair a name be guilty of 
6uch crimes in secret ! ” said the locksmith, musing. 


88 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ Heaven forgive me if I am wrong, and send me just 
thoughts ; but she is poor, the temptation may be great, 
and we daily hear of things as strange. — Ay, bark 
away, my friend. If there’s any wickedness going on, 
that raven’s in it, I’ll be sworn.” 


BAR NAB Y RUDGE. 


89 



CHAPTER VIL 

Mrs. Varden was a lady of what is commonly called 
an uncertain temper — a phrase which being inter- 
preted signifies a temper tolerably certain to make 
everybody more or less uncomfortable. Thus it gener- 
ally happened, that when other people were merry, Mrs. 
Varden was dull ; and that when other people were 
dull, Mrs. Varden was disposed to be amazingly cheer- 
ful. Indeed the worthy housewife was of such a capri- 
cious nature, that she not only attained a higher pitch 
of genius than Macbeth, in respect of her ability to be 
wise, amazed, temperate and furious, loyal and neutral 
in an instant, but would sometimes ring the changes 
backwards and forwards on all possible moods and 
flights in one short quarter of an hour ; performing, as 
it were, a kind of triple bob-major on the peal of in- 
struments in the female belfry, with a skilfulness and 
rapidity of execufton that astonished all who heard 
her. 

It had been observed in this good lady (who did not 
want for personal attractions, being plump and buxom 
to look at, though like her fair daughter, somewhat 
short in stature) that this uncertainty of disposition 
strengthened and increased with her temporal pros- 
perity ; and divers wise men and matrons on friendly 
‘erms with the* locksmith and his family, even went so 
far as to assert, that a tumble-down some half dozen 


90 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


rounds in the world’s ladder — such as the breaking 
of the bank in which her husband kept his money, or 
some little fall of that kind — would be the making of 
her, and could hardly fail to render her one of the most 
agreeable companions in existence. Whether they were 
right or wrong in this conjecture, certain it is that minds, 
like bodies, will often fall into a pimpled ill-conditioned 
state from mere excess of comfort, and like them, are 
often successfully cured by remedies in themselves very 
nauseous and unpalatable. 

Mrs. Varden’s chief aider and abettor, and at the 
same time her principal victim and object of wrath, 
was her single domestic servant, one Miss Miggs ; or 
as she was called, in conformity with those prejudices 
of society which lop and top from poor handmaidens 
all such genteel excrescences — Miggs. This Miggs 
was a tall young lady, very much addicted to pattens in 
private life ; slender and shrewish, of a rather uncom- 
fortable figure, and though not absolutely ill-looking, of 
a sharp and acid visage. As a general principle and 
abstract proposition, Miggs held the male sex to be ut- 
terly contemptible and unworthy of notice ; to be fickle, 
false, base, sottish, inclined to perjury and wholly unde- 
serving. When particularly exasp^ated against them 
(which, scandal said was when Sim Tappertit slighted 
her most) sh^ was accustomed to wish with great em- 
phasis that the whole race of women could but die off, 
in order that the men might be brought to know the 
real value of the blessings by which they set so little 
store ; nay, her feeling for her order ran so high, that 
she sometimes declared, if she could only have good 
security for a fair, round number — say ten thousand 
^of young virgins following her example, she would, 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


91 


to spite mankind, hang, drown, stab, or poison herself, 
with a joy past all expression. 

It was the voice of Miggs that greeted the locksmith, 
when he knocked at his own house, with a shrill cry 
of “ Who’s there ? ” 

“ Me, girl, me,” returned Gabriel. 

“ What, already, sir ! ” said Miggs, opening the door 
with a look of surprise. “We was just getting on our 
nightcaps to sit up, — me and mistress. Oh, she has 
been so bad ! ” 

Miggs said this with an air of uncommon candor and 
concern ; but the parlor-door was standing open, and as 
Gabriel very well knew for whose ears it was designed, 
he regarded her with anything but an approving look 
as he passed in. 

“Master’s come home, mim,” cried Miggs, running 
before him into the parlor. “ You was wrong, mim, and 
I was right. I thought he wouldn’t keep us up so late 
two nights running, mim. Master’s always considerate 
so far. I’m so glad, mim, on your account. I’m a lit- 
tle ” — here Miggs simpered — “ a little sleepy myself ; 
I’ll own it now, mim, though I said I wasn’t when you 
asked me. It a’n’t of no consequence, mim, of course.” 

“ You had better,” said the locksmith, who most 
devoutly wished that Barnaby’s raven was at Miggs* 
ankles, “ you had better get to bed at once then.” 

“ Thanking you kindly, sir,” returned Miggs, “ I 
couldn’t take my rest in peace, nor fix my thoughts 
upon my prayers, otherways than that I knew mistress 
was comfortable in her bed this night ; by rights she 
should have been there, hours ago.” 

“ You’re talkative, mistress,” said Varden, pulling off 
liis great-coat, and looking at her askew. 


92 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ Taking the hint, sir,” cried Miggs, with a flushed 
face, ‘‘and thanking you for* it most kindly, I will make 
bold to say, that if I give offence by having considera- 
. tion for my mistress, I do not ask your pardon, but am 
content to get myself into trouble and to be in suffering." 

Here Mrs. Varden, who, with her countenance shroud- 
ed in a large nightcap, had been all this time intern 
upon the Protestant Manual, looked round, and acknowl- 
edged Miggs’ championship by 'commanding her to hold 
her tongue. 

Every little bone in Miggs’ throat and neck developed 
itself with a spitefulness quite alarming, as she replied, 
•‘Yes, mim, I will.” 

“ How do you find yourself now, my dear ? ” said 
the locksmith, taking a chair near his wife (who had 
resumed her book), and rubbing his knees hard as he 
made the inquiry. 

“ You’re very anxious to know, a’n’t you ? ” returned 
Mrs. Varden, with her eyes upon the print. “ You, that 
have not been near me all day, and wouldn’t have been 
if I was dying ! ” 

“ My dear Martha ” — said Gabriel. 

Mrs. Varden turned over to the next page ; then 
went back again to the bottom lin« over leaf to be quite 
sure of the last words, and then went on reading with an 
appearance of the deepest interest and study. 

“ My dear Martha,” said the locksmith, “ how can you 
say such things, when you know you don’t mean them ? 
If you were dying ! Why, if there was anything serious 
the matter with you, Martha, shouldn’t I be in constant 
attendance upon you ? ” 

“Yes ! ” cried Mrs. Varden, bursting into tears, “ yes, 
you would. I don’t doubt it, Varden. Certainly you 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


93 


would. That’s as much as to tell me that you would 
be hovering round me like a vulture, waiting till the 
breath was out of my body, that you might go and 
marry somebody else.” 

Miggs groaned in sympathy — a little short groan, 
checked in its birth, and changed into a cough. It 
seemed to say, “ I can’t help it; It’s wrung from me by 
the dreadful brutality of that monster master.” 

“ But you’ll break my heart one of these days,” addjid 
Mrs. Varden, with more resignation, “ and then we shall 
both be happy. My only desire is to see Dolly comfort- 
ably settled, and when she is, you may settle me as soon 
as you like.” 

“ Ah ! ” cried Miggs — and coughed again. 

Poor Gabriel twisted his wig about in silence for a 
long time, and then said mildly, “ Has Dolly gone to 
bed?” 

Your master speaks to you,” said Mrs. Varden, look- 
ing sternly over her shoulder at Miss Miggs in waiting. 

“ No, my dear, I spoke to you,” suggested the lock- 
smith. 

“Did you hear me, Miggs?” cried the obdurate 
lady, stamping her foot upon the ground. “ You are 
beginning to despise me now, are you? But this is 
example ! ” 

At this cruel rebuke, Miggs, whose tears were always 
ready, for large or small parties, on the shortest notice 
and the most reasonable terms, fell a-crying violently ; 
holding both her hands tight upon her heart meanwhile, 
as if nothing less would prevent its splitting into small 
fragments. Mrs. Varden, who likewise possessed that 
faculty in high perfection, wept too, against Miggs ; and 
with such effect that Miggs gave in after a time, and, 


94 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


except for an occasional sob, which seemed to threaten 
some remote intention of breaking out again, left her 
mistress in possession of the field. Her superiority 
being thoroughly asserted, that lady soon desisted like- 
wise, and fell into a quiet melancholy. 

The relief was so great, and the fatiguing occurrences 
of last night so completely overpowered the locksmith, 
that he nodded in his chair, and would doubtless have 
slept there all night, but for the voice of Mrs. Varden, 
which, after a pause of some five minutes, awoke him 
with a start. 

“ If I am ever,” said Mrs. V. — not scolding, but in a 
sort of monotonous remonstrance — “ in spirits, if I am 
ever cheerful, if I am ever more than usually disposed 
to be talkative and comfortable, this is the way I am 
treated.” 

“ Such spirits as you was in too, mim, but half an 
hour ago ! ” cried Miggs. “ I never see such company ! ” 

“Because,” said Mrs. Varden, “because I never in- 
terfere or interrupt, because I never question where any- 
body comes or goes ; because my whole mind and soul is 
bent on saving where I can save, and laboring in this 
house ; — therefore, they try me as they do.” 

“ Martha,” urged the locksmith, endeavoring to look 
as wakeful as possible, “ what is it you complain of? I 
really came home with every wish and desire to be 
happy. I did, indeed.” 

“ What do I complain of ! ” retorted his wife. “ Is it 
a chilling thing to have one’s husband sulking and falling 
asleep directly he comes home — to have him freezing 
all one’s warm-heartedness, and throwing cold water over, 
the fireside? Is it natural, when I know he went out 
upon a matter in which I am us much interested as any- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


95 


body can be, that I should wish to know all that has 
happened, or that he should tell me without my begging 
and praying him to do it ? Is that natural, or is it 
not ? ” 

I am very sorry, Martha,” . said the good-natured 
locksmith. “ I was really afraid you were not disposed 
to talk pleasantly; I’ll tell you everything; I shall only 
be too glad, my dear.” 

“ No, Varden,” returned his wife, rising with dignity, 
“ I dare say — thank you ! I’m not a child to be cor- 
rected one minute and petted the next — I’m a little too 
old for that, Varden. Miggs, carry the light. You can 
be cheerful, Miggs, at least.” 

Miggs, who, to this moment, had been in the very 
.depths of compassionate despondency, passed instantly 
into the liveliest state conceivable, and tossing her head 
as she glanced towards the locksmith, bore off her mis- 
tress and the light together. 

“ Now, who would think,” thought Varden, shrugging 
his shoulders and drawing his chair nearer to the fire, 
“ that that woman could ever be pleasant and agreeable ? 
And yet she can be. Well, well, all of us have our 
faults. I’ll not be hard upon hers. We have been man 
and wife too long for that.” 

He dozed again — not the less pleasantly, perhaps, for 
his hearty t3mper. While his eyes were closed, the door 
leading to the upper stairs was partially opened ; and a 
head appeared, which, at sight of him, hastily drew back 
again. 

“I wish,” murmured Gabriel, waking at the noise, 
and looking round the room, “ I wish somebody would 
marry Miggs. But that’s impossible ! I wonder whether 
there’s any madman alive, who would marry Miggs ! ” 


96 


BARNABY RUDGE 


This was such a vast speculation that he fell into a 
doze again, and slept until the fire was quite burnt out. 
At last he roused himself ; and having double-locked the 
street-door according to custom, and put the key in his 
pocket, went off to bed. 

He had not left the room in darkness many minutes, 
when the head again appeared, and Sim Tappertit en- 
tered, bearing in his hand a little lamp. 

“What the devil business has he to stop up so late ! ” 
muttered Sim, passing into the workshop, and setting it 
down upon the forge. “ Here’s half the night gone 
already. There’s only one good that has ever come to 
me, out of this cursed old rusty mechanical trade, and 
that’s this piece of ironmongery, upon my soul ! ” 

As he spoke, he drew from the right hand, or rather 
right leg pocket of Ids smalls, a clumsy large-sized key, 
which he inserted cautiously in the lock his master had 
secured, and softly opened the door. That done, he re- 
placed his piece of secret workmanship in his pocket; 
and leaving the lamp burning, and closing the door care- 
fully and without noise, stole out into the street — as 
little suspected by the locksmith in his sound deep sleep, 
as by Barnaby himself in his phantom-haunted dreams. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


•57 


CHAPTER VIIL 

? Clear of the locksmith’s house, Sim Tappertit laid 
aside his cautious manner, .and assuming in its stead that 
of a ruffling, swaggering, roving blade, who would rather 
kill a man than otherwise, and eat him too if needful, 
made the best of his way along the darkened streets. 

Half pausing for an instant now and then to smite his 
pocket and assure himself of the safety of his master-key, 
he hurried on to Barbican, and turning into one of the 
narrowest of the narrow streets which diverged from 
that centre, slackened his pace and wiped his heated 
brow, as if the termination of his walk were near at 
iiand. 

It was not a very choice spot for midnight expeditions, 
being in truth one of more than questionable character, 
and of an appearance by no means inviting. From the 
main street he had entered, itself little better than an 
alley, a low-browed door-way led into a blind court, or 
yard, profoundly dark, unpaved, and reeking with stag- 
nant odors. Into this ill-favored pit, the locksmith’? 
vagrant ’prentice groped his way ; and stopping at a 
house from whose defaced and rotten front the rude 
effigy of a bottle swung to and fro like some gibbeted 
malefactor, struck thrice upon an iron grating with his 
foot. After listening in vain for some response to his 
signal, lyir. Tappertit became impatient, and struck the 
grating thrice again. 

VOL. I. 


7 


BARNABY KUDGE. 


• 


A furtller delay ensued, but it was not of long dura- 
tion. The ground seemed to open at his feet, and a 
ragged head appeared. 

“ Is that the captain ? ” said a voice as ragged as the 
head. 

“ Yes,” replied Mr. Tappertit haughtily, descending 
as he spoke, “who should it be?” 

“ It’s so late, we gave you up,” returned the voice, as 
its owner stopped to shut and fasten the grating. “ You’re 
late, sir.” 

“Lead on,” said Mr. Tappertit, with a gloomy maj- 
esty, “and make remarks when I require you. For- 
ward ! ” 

This latter word of command was perhaps somewhat 
theatrical and unnecessary, inasmuch as the descent was 
by a very narrow, steep, and slippery flight of steps, and 
any rashness or departure from the beaten track must 
have ended in a yawning water-butt. But Mr. Tapper- 
tit being, like some other great commanders, favorable to* 
strong effects, and personal display, cried “ Forward ! ” 
again, in the hoarsest voice he could assume ; and led the 
way, with folded arms and knitted brows, to the cellar 
down below, where there was a small copper fixed in one 
corner, a chair or two, a form and table, a glimmering 
fire, and a truckle-bed, covered with a ragged patchwork 
rug. 

“ Welcome, noble captain ! ” cried a lanky figure, ris- 
ng as from a nap. 

The captain nodded. Then, throwing off his outer 
coat, he stood composed in all his dignity, and eyed 
bis follower over. 

“ What news to-night?” he asked, when he had looked 
into his very soul. 


BARNABY KUDGE. 


99 


“Nothing particular,” replied the other, stretching 
himself — and he was so long already that it was 
quite alarming to see him do it — “ how come you to 
be so late ? ” 

^ “ No matter,” was all the captain deigned to say in 
answer. “ Is the room prepared ? ” 

“ It is,” replied his follower. • 

“ The comrade — is he here ? ” 

“ Yes. And a sprinkling of the others — you hear 
'em ? ” 

“ Playing skittles ! ” said the captain, moodily. “ Light- 
hearted revellers ! ” 

There was no doubt respecting the particular amuse- 
ment in which these heedless spirits were indulging, for 
even in the close and stifling atmosphere of the vault, 
tlie noise sounded like distant thunder. It certainly ap- 
peared, at first sight, a singular spot to choose, for tliat 
or any other purpose of relaxation, if the other cellars 
answered to the one in which this brief colloquy took 
place ; for the floors were of sodden earth, the walls and 
roof of damp bare brick tapestried with the tracks of 
snails and slugs ; the air was sickening, tainted, and of- 
fensive. It seemed from one strong flavor which was 
uppermost among the various pdors of the place, that it 
had, at no very distant period, been used as a storehouse 
for cheeses ; a circumstance which, while it accounted for 
the greasy moisture that hung about it, was agreeably 
suggestive of rats. It was naturally damp besides, and 
little trees of fungus sprung from every mouldering 
fiorner. 

The proprietor of this charming retreat, and owner ot 
the ragged head before mentioned — for he wore an old 
\ie-wig as bare and frouzy as a stunted hearth-broom — ■ 


100 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


had by this time joined them ; and stood a little apai*t, 
rubbing his hands, wagging his hoary bristled chin, and 
smiling in silence. His eyes were closed ; but had they 
been wide open, it would have been easy to tell, from the 
attentive expression of the face he turned towards them 
— pale and unwholesome as might be expected in one 
of his underground existence — and from a certain anx- 
ious raising and quivering of the lids, that he was 
blind. 

“ Even Stagg hath been asleep,” said the long com- 
rade, nodding towards this person. 

“ Sound, captain, sound ! ” cried the blind man ; “ what 
does my noble captain drink — is it brandy, rum, usque- 
baugh ? Is it soaked gunpowder, or blazing oil ? Give 
it a name, heart of oak, and we’d get it for you, if it was 
wine from a bishop’s cellar, or melted gold from King 
George’s mint.” 

“ See,” said Mr. Tappertit haughtily, “ that it’s some- 
thing strong, and comes quick ; and so long as you take 
care of that, you may bring it from the devil’s cellar, if 
you like.” 

“ Boldly said, noble captain ! ” rejoined the blind man. 
“ Spoken like the ’Prentices’ Glory. Ha, ha! From the 
devil’s cellar ! A brave joke ! The captain joketh. Ha, 
ha, ha 1 ” 

“ I’ll tell you what, my fine feller,” said Mr. Tapper- 
tit, eying the host over as he walked to a closet, and 
took out a bottle and glass as carelessly as if he had, 
been in full possession of his sight, “ if you make that 
row, you’ll find that the captain’s very far from joking, 
und so I tell you.” 

“ He’s got his eyes on me I ” cried Stagg, stopping 
^hort on his way back, and affecting to screen his face 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


101 


with the bottle. “ I feel ’em though I can’t see ’em. 
Take ’em off, noble captain. Remove ’em, for they 
pierce like gimlets.” 

Mr. Tappertit smiled grimly at his comrade ; and 
twisting out one more look — a kind of ocular screw 
— under the influence of which the blind man feigned 
to undergo great anguish and torture, bade him, in a 
softened tone, approach, and hold his peace. 

“ I obey you, captain,” cried Stagg, drawing close to 
him and filling out a bumper without spilling a drop, by 
reason that he held his little finger at the brim of the glass, 
and stopped at the instant the liquor touched it, “ drink, 
noble governor. Death to all masters, life to all ’pren- 
tices, and love to all fair damsels. Drink, brave general, 
and warm your gallant heart ! ” 

Mr. Tappertit condescended to take the glass from his 
outstretched hand. Stagg then dropped on one knee, 
and gently smoothed the calves of his legs, with an air 
of humble admiration. 

“ That I. had but eyes ! ” he cried, “ to behold my cap- 
tain’s symmetrical proportions ! That I had but eyes, to 
look upon these twin invaders of domestic peace ! ” 

“ Get out ! ” said Mr. Tappertit, glancing downward 
at his favorite limbs. “ Go along, will you Stagg ! ” 

“ When I touch my own afterwards,” cried the host, 
smiting them reproachfully, “ I hale ’em. Comparative- 
ly speaking, they’ve no more shape than wooden legs, 
beside these models of my noble captain’s.” 

“ Yours ! ” exclaimed Mr. Tappertit. “ No, I should 
think not. Don’t talk about those precious old tooth- 
picks in the same breath with mine ; that’s rather too 
much. Here. Take the glass. Benjamin. Lead on. 
To business ! ” 


102 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


With these words, he folded his arms again ; and 
frowning with a sullen majesty, passed with his com- 
panion through a little door at the upper end of the 
cellar, and disappeared; leaving Stagg to his private 
meditations. 

The vault they entered, strewn with sawdust and 
dimly lighted, was between the outer one from which 
they had just come, and that in which the skittle-players 
were diverting themselves ; as was manifested by the in- 
creased noise and clamor of tongues, which was suddenly 
stopped, however, and replaced by a dead silence, at a 
signal from the long comrade. Then, this young gentle- 
man, going to a little cupboard, returned with a thigh- 
bone, which in forrher times must have been part and 
parcel of some individual at least as long as himself, 
and placed the same in the hands of Mr. Tappertit; 
who, receiving it as a sceptre and staff of authority, 
cocked his three-cornered hat fiercely on the top of his 
head, and mounted a large table, whereon a chair of 
state, cheerfully ornamented with a couple of skulls, was 
placed ready for his reception. 

He had no sooner assumed this position, than anothQr 
young gentleman appeared, bearing in his arms a huge 
clasped book, who made him a profound obeisance, and 
delivering it to the long comrade, advanced to the table, 
and turning his back upon it, stood there Atlas-wise. 
Then, the long comrade got upon the table too; and 
seating himself in a lower chair than Mr. Tappertit’s 
with much state and ceremony, placed the large book on 
the shoulders of their mute companion as deliberately as 
if he had been a wooden desk, and prepared to make 
entries therein with a pen of cori-esponding size. 

When the long comrade had made these preparations. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


103 


he looked towards Mr. Tappertit ; and Mr. Tappertit, 
flourishing the bone, knocked nine times therewith upon 
one of the skulls. At the ninth stroke, a third young 
gentleman emerged from the door leading to the skittle- 
ground, and bowing low, awaited his commands. 

“ ’ Prentice ! ” said the mighty captain, “ who waits 
without?” 

The ’prentice made answer that a stranger was in at- 
tendance, who claimed admission into that secret society 
of ’Prentice Knights, and a free participation in their 
rights, privileges, and immunities. Thereupon Mr. Tap- 
pertit flourished the bone again, and giving the other 
skull a prodigious rap on the nose, exclaimed “ Admit 
him ! ” At these dread words the ’prentice bowed once 
more, and so withdrew as he had come. 

There soon appeared at the same door, two other 
’prentices, having between them a third, whose eyes 
were bandaged, and who was attired in a bag-wig, and a 
broad-skirted coat, trimmed with tarnished lace ; and 
who was girded with a sword, in compliance with the 
laws of the Institution regulating the introduction of 
candidates, which required them to assume this courtly 
dress, and kept it constantly in lavender, for their con- 
venience. One of the conductors of this novice held a 
rusty blunderbuss pointed towards his ear, and the other 
a very ancient sabre, with which he carved imaginar;^ 
offenders as he came along in a sanguinary and anatomi- 
cal manner. 

As this silent group advanced, Mr. Tappertit fixed liiy 
hat upon his head. The novice then laid his hand upon 
his breast and bent before him. When he had humbled 
tiimself sufficiently, the captain ordered the bandage to 
be removed, and proceeded to eye him over. 


104 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ Ha ! ” said the captain, thoughtfully, when he had 
concluded this ordeal. “ Proceed.” 

The long comrade read aloud as follows : — “ Mark 
Gilbert. Age, nineteen. Bound to Thomas Curzon, 
hosier. Golden Fleece, Aldgate. Loves Curzon’s daugh- 
ter. Cannot say that Curzon’s daughter loves him. 
Should think 4t probable. Curzon pulled his ears last 
Tuesday week.” 

“ How ! ” cried the captain, starting. 

“ For looking at his daughter, please you,” said the 
novice. 

“ Write Curzon down. Denounced,” said the captain. 
“Put a black cross against the name of Curzon.” 

“ So please you,” said the novice, “ that’s not the 
worst — he calls his ’prentice idle dog, and stops his 
beer unless he works to his liking. He gives Dutch 
cheese, too, eating Cheshire sir, himself ; and Sundays 
out, are only once a month.” 

“This,” said Mr. Tappertit gravely, “is a flagrant 
case. Put two black crosses to the name of Curzon.” 

“ If the society,” said the novice, who was an ill- 
looking, one-sided, shambling lad, with sunken eyes set 
close together in his head — “ if the society would burn 
his house down — for he’s not insured — or beat him 
as he comes home from his club at night, or help me 
to carry olF his daughter, and marry her at the Fleet, 
whether she gave consent or no ” — 

Mr. Tappertit waved his grizzly truncheon as an 
admonition to him not to interrupt, and ordered three 
black crosses to the name of Curzon. 

“ Which means,” he said in gracious explanation, 
“ vengeance, complete and terrible. ’Prentice, do you 
V)ve the Constitution ? ” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


105 


To which the novice (being to that end instructed 
by his attendant sponsors) replied “I do ! ” 

“ The Church, the State, and everything established 
' — but the masters?” quoth the captain. 

Again the novice said “ I do.” 

Having said it, he listened meekly to the captain, 
who, in an address prepared for such occasions, told 
him how* that under that same Constitution (which was 
kept in a strong box somewhere, but where exactly 
he could not find out, or he would have endeavored 
to procure a copy of it), the ’prentices had, in times 
gone by, had frequent holidays of right, broken peo- 
ple’s heads by scores, defied their masters, nay, even 
achieved some glorious murders in the streets, which 
privileges had gradually been wrested from them, and 
in all which noble aspirations they were now restrained ; 
how the degrading checks imposed upon them were 
unquestionably attributable to the innovating spirit of 
the times, and how they united therefore to resist all 
change, except such change as would restore those 
good old English customs, by which they would stand 
or fall. After illustrating the wisdom of going back- 
ward, by reference to that sagacious fish, the crab, 
and the not unfrequent practice of the mule and don- 
key, he described their general objects ; which were 
briefiy vengeance on their Tyrant Masters (of whose 
grievous and insupportable oppression no ’prentice could 
entertain a moment’s doubt) and the restoration, as 
aforesaid, of their ancient rights and holidays ; for 
neither of which objects were they now quite ripe, 
being barely twenty strong, but which they pledged 
themselves to pursue with fire and sword when need- 
ful. Then he described the oath which every member 


106 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


of that small remnant of a noble body took, and which 
was of a dreadful and impressive kind ; binding him 
at the bidding of his chief, to resist and obstruct the 
Lord Mayor, sword-bearer, and chaplain ; to despise 
the authority of the sheriffs ; and to hold the court 
of aldermen as nought ; but not on any account, in 
case the fulness of time should bring a general rising 
of ’prentices, to damage or in any way disfigure Tem- 
ple Bar, which was strictly constitutional and always 
to be approached with reverence. Having gone over 
these several heads with great eloquence and force, 
and having further informed the novice that this society 
had had its origin in his own teeming brain, stimulated 
by a swelling sense of wrong and outrage, Mr. Tappertit 
demanded whether he had strength of heart to take the 
mighty pledge required, or whether he would withdraw 
while retreat was yet within his power. 

To this, the novice made rejoinder that he would take the 
vow, though it should choke him ; and it was accordingly 
administered with many impressive circumstances, among 
which the lighting up of the two skulls with a candle- 
end inside of each, and a great many flourishes with the 
bone, were chiefly conspicuous ; not to mention a variety 
of grave exercises with the blunderbuss and sabre, and 
oome dismal groaning by unseen ’prentices without. All 
these dark and direful ceremonies being at length com- 
pleted, the table was put aside, the chair of state re- 
moved, the sceptre locked up in its usual cupboard, the 
doors of communication between the three cellars thrown 
freely open, and the ’Prentice Knights resigned them- 
Belves to merriment. 

But Mr. Tappertit, who had a soul above the vulgar 
iterd, and who, on account of his greatness, could only 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


107 


Rfibrd to be merry now and then, threw himself on a 
bench with the air of a man who was faint with dignity. 
He looked with an indifferent eye, alike on skittles, cards, 
and dice, thinking only of the locksmith’s daughter, and 
the base degenerate days on which he had fallen. 

“ My noble captain neither games, nor sings, nor 
dances,” said his host, taking a seat beside him. “ Drink, 
gallant general ! ” 

Mr. Tappertit drained the proffered goblet to the 
dregs ; then thrust his hands into his pockets, and with 
a lowering visage walked among the skittles, while his 
followers (such is the influence of superior genius) re- 
strained the ardent ball, and held his little shins in dumb 
respect. 

“ If I had been born a corsair or a pirate, a brigand, 
genteel highwayman or patriot — and they’re the same 
thing,” thought Mr. Tappertit, musing among the nine- 
pins, “ I should have been all right. But to drag out a 
ignoble existence unbeknown to mankind in general — 
patience! I will be famous yet. A voice within me 
keeps on whispering Greatness. I shall burst out one 
of these days, and when I do, what power can keep me 
down ? I feel my soul getting into my head at the idea. 
More drink there I ” 

“ The novice,” pursued Mr. Tappertit, not exactly in 
a voice of thunder, for his tones, to say the truth, were 
rather cracked and shrill, — but very impressively, not- 
withstanding — “ where is he ? ” 

“ Here, noble captain I ” cried Stagg. “ One stands, 
beside me who I feel is a stranger.” 

“ Have you,” said Mr. Tappertit, letting his gaze 
fell on the party indicated, who was indeed the new 
V^night, by this time restored to his own apparel ; 


108 


BArtNABY RUDGE. 


“have you the impression of your street-door key in 
wax ? ” 

The long comrade anticipated the reply, by producing 
it from the shelf on which it had been deposited. 

“Good,” said Mr. Tappertit, scrutinizing it attentively, 
while a breathless silence reigned around ; for he had 
constructed secret door-keys for the whole society, and 
perhaps owed something of his influence to that mean 
and trivial circumstance — on such slight accidents do 
even men of mind depend ! — “ This is easily made. 
Come hither, friend.” 

With that, he beckoned the new knight apart, and 
putting the pattern in his pocket, motioned to him to 
walk by his side. 

“ And so,” he said, when they had taken a few turns 
up and down, “ you — you love your master’s daughter ? ” 

“ I do,” said the ’prentice. “ Honor bright. No chaff, 
you know.” 

“ Have you,” rejoined Mr. Tappertit, catching him by 
the wrist, and giving him a look which would have been 
expressive of the most deadly malevolence, but for an 
accidental hiccup that rather interfered with it ; “ have 
you a — a rival ? ” 

“Not as I know on,” replied the ’prertice. 

“ If you had now ” — said Mr. Tappertit — “ what 
would you — eh ? ” — 

. The ’prentice looked fierce and clinched his fists. 

“ It is enough,” cried Mr. Tappertit hastily, “ we un- 
.derstand each other. We are observed. I thank you.” 

So saying, he cast him off again ; and calling the long 
comrade aside after taking a few hasty turns by himself, 
bade him immediately write and post against the wall, a 
notice proscribing one Joseph Willet (commonly known 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


109 


as Joe) of Chigwell ; forbidding all ’Prentice Knights to 
succor, comfort, or hold communion with him ; and re- 
quiring them, on pain of excommunication, to molest, 
hurt, wrong, annoy, and pick quarrels with the said 
Joseph, whensoever and wheresoever they, or any of 
them, should happen to encounter him. 

Having relieved his mind by this energetic proceed- 
ing, he condescended to approach the festive board, and 
warming by degrees, at length deigned to preside, and 
even to enchant the company with a song. After this, 
he rose to such a pitch as to consent to regale the society 
with a hornpipe, which he actually performed to the 
music of a fiddle, (played by an ingenious member,) with 
such surpassing agility and brilliancy of execution, that 
the spectators could not be sufficiently enthusiastic in 
their admiration ; and their host protested, with tears in 
his eyes, that he had never truly felt his blindness until 

that moment. 

# 

But the host withdrawing — probably to weep in se- 
cret — soon returned with the information that it wanted 
little more than an hour of day, and that all the cocks 
in Barbican had already begun to crow, as if their 
lives depended on it. At this intelligence, the ’Pren- 
tice Knights arose in haste, and marshalling into a line, 
filed off one by one and dispersed with all speed to 
their several homes, leaving their leader to pass the 
grating last. 

“ Good-night, noble captain,” whispered the blind man 
as he held it open for his passage out. “ Farewell brave 
general. By, by, illustrious commander. Good luck 
go with you for a — conceited, bragging, empty-headed, 
Juck-legged idiot.” 

With which parting words, coolly added as he lis- 


no 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


tened to his receding footsteps and Jocked the grate 
upon himself, he descended the steps, and lighting the 
fire below the little copper, prepared, without any as-, 
sistance, for his daily occupation ; which was to retail 
at the area-head above pennyworths of broth and soup, 
and savory puddings, compounded of such scraps as 
were to be bought in the heap for the least money at 
Fleet Market in the evening time ; and for the sale of 
which he had need to have depended chiefly on his 
private connection, for the court had no thoroughfare, 
and was not that kind of place in which many people 
were likely to take the air, or to frequent as an agree- 
able promenade. 


BARNABY RFDGE. 


ill 


CHAPTER IX. 

Chroniclers are privileged to enter where they list; 
to come and go through key-holes, to ride upon the wind, 
to overcome, in their soarings up and down, all obstacles 
of distance, time, and place. Thrice blessed be this last 
consideration, since it enables us to follow the disdainful 
Miggs even into the sanctity of her chamber, and to hold 
her in sweet companionship through the dreary watches 
of the night ! 

Miss Miggs, having undone her mistress, as she 
phrased it (which means, assisted to undress her), and 
having seen her comfortably to bed in the back-room 
on the first floor, withdrew to her own apartment, in 
the attic story. Notwithstanding her declaration in the 
locksmith’s presence, she was in no mood for sleep ; 
so, putting her light upon the table and withdrawing 
the little window-curtain, she gazed out pensively at 
the wild night sky. 

Perhaps she wondered what star was destined for her 
habitation when she had run her little course below ; 
perhaps speculated which of those glimmering spheres 
might be the natal orb of Mr. Tappertit ; perhaps mar- 
velled how they could gaze down on that perfidious 
creature, man, and not sicken and turn green as chem- 
ists’ lamps; perhaps thought of nothing in particular. 
Whatever she thought about, there she sat, until her 
attention, alive to anything connected with the insinu- 


2 


BAKNABY RUDGE. 


ating ’prentice, was attracted by a noise in the next 
room to her own — his room ; the room in which he 
slept, and dreamed — it might be, sometimes dreamed 
of her. 

That he was not dreaming now, unless he was taking 
a walk in his sleep, was clear, for every now and then 
there came a shuffling noise, as though he were engaged 
in polishing the whitewashed wall ; then a gentle creak- 
ing of his door ; then the faintest indication of his 
stealthy footsteps on the landing-place outside. Noting 
this latter circumstance. Miss Miggs turned pale and 
shuddered, as mistrusting his intentions ; and more than 
once exclaimed, below her breath, “ Oh ! what a Provi- 
dence it is, as I am bolted in ! ” — which, owing doubt- 
less to her alarm, was a confusion of ideas on her part 
between a bolt and its use ; for though there was . one 
on the door, it was not fastened. 

Miss Miggs’s sense of hearing, however, having as 
sharp an edge as her temper, and being of the same 
snappish and suspicious kind, very soon informed her 
that the footsteps passed her door, and appeared to have 
some object quite separate and disconnected from her- 
self. At this discovery, she became more alarmed than 
ever, and was about to give utterance to those cries of 

Thieves ! ” and “ Murder ! ” which she had hitherto 
restrained, when it occurred to her to look softly out, 
and see that her fears had some good palpable foun- 
dation. 

Looking out accordingly, and stretching her neck 
over the handrail, she descried, to her great amazement, 
Mr. Tappertit completely' dressed, stealing down-stairs, 
one step at a time, with his shoes in one hand and a 
lamp in the other. Following him with her eyes, and 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


113 


going down a little way herself to get the better of an 
intervening angle, she beheld him thrust his head in at 
the parlor-door, draw it back again with great swiftness, 
and immediately begin a retreat up-stairs with all pos- 
sible expedition. 

“ Here’s mysteries ! ” said the damsel, when she was 
safe in her own room again, quite out of breath. “ Oh 
gracious, here’s mysteries ! ” 

The prospect of finding anybody out in anything, 
would have kept Miss Miggs awake under the influence 
of henbane. Presently she heard the step again, as she 
would have doner if it had been that of a featlier en- 
dowed with motion and walking down on tiptoe. Then 
gliding out as before, she again beheld the retreating 
figure of the ’prentice ; again he looked cautiously in at 
the parlor-door, but this time, instead of retreating, he 
passed in, and disappeared. 

Miggs was back in her room, and had her head out 
of the window, before an elderly gentleman could have 
winked and recovered from it. Out he came at the 
street-door, shut it carefully behind him, tried it with 
his knee, and swaggered off, putting something in his 
pocket as he went along. At this spectacle Miggs cried 
“ Gracious ! ” again, and then “ Goodness gracious ! ” 
and then, “ Goodness gracious me ! ” and then, candle 
. in hand, went down-stairs as he had done. Coming to 
the workshop, she saw the lamp burning on the forge, 
?nd everything as Sim had left it. 

“ Why I wish I may only have a walking funeral, and 
never be buried decent with a mourning-coach and 
feathers, if the boy hasn’t been and made a key for 
his own self ! ” cried Miggs. “ Oh the little villain ! ” 
This conclusion was not arrived at without consider- 
voL,. I. ■ 8 


lU 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


{ition, and much peeping and peering about ; nor was 
it unassisted by the recollection that she had on several 
occasions come upon the ’prentice suddenly, and found 
him busy at some mysterious occupation. Lest the fact 
of Miss Miggs calling him, on whom she stooped to cast 
a favorable eye, a boy, should" create surprise in any 
breast, it may be observed that she invariably affected 
to regard all male bipeds under thirty as mere chits 
and infants ; which phenomenon is not unusual in la- 
dies of Miss Miggs’s temper, and is indeed generally 
found to be the associate of such indomitable and savage 
virtue. 

Miss Miggs deliberated within herself for some little 
time, looking hard at the shop-door while she did so, as 
though her eyes and thoughts were both upon it ; and 
then, taking a sheet of paper from a drawer, twisted 
it into a long thin spiral tube. Having filled this in- 
strument with a quantity of small coal-dust from the 
forge, she approached the door, and dropping on one 
knee before it, dexterously blew into the key-hole as 
much of these fine ashes as the lock would hold. When 
she had filled it to the brim in a very workmanlike and 
skilful manner, she crept up-stairs again, and chuckled 
as she went. 

“ There ! ” cried Miggs, rubbing her hands, now 
let’s see whether you won’t be glad to take some no- 
tice of me, mister. He, he, he ! You’ll have eyes for 
somebody besides Miss Dolly now, I think. A fat-faced 
puss she is, as ever 1 come across ! ” 

As she uttered this criticism, she glanced approvingly 
Hfc her small mirror, as who should say, I thank my stars 
that can’t be said of me ; — as it certainly could not ; 
for Miss Miggs’s style of beauty was of that kind which 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


115 


Mr. Tappertit himself 4iad not inaptly termed, in private, 
“ scraggy.” 

“ I don'v go to bed this night ! ” said Miggs, wrapping 
herself in a shawl, and drawing a couple of chairs near 
the window, flouncing down upon one, and putting her 
feet upon the other, “ till you come home, my lad. 
wouldn’t,” said Miggs, viciously, “ no, not for five-and 
forty pound ! ” 

With that, and with an expression of face in which a 
great number of opposite ingredients, such as mischief, 
cunning, malice, triumph, and patient expectation, were 
all mixed up together in a kind of physiognomical punch. 
Miss Miggs composed herself to wait and listen, like 
some fair ogress who had set a trap and was watching 
for a nibble from a plump young traveller. 

She sat there, with perfect composure, all night. At 
length, just upon break of day, there was a footstep in 
the street, and presently she could hear Mr. Tappertit 
stop at the door. Then she could make out that he tried 
his key — that he was blowing into it — that he knocked 
it on the nearest post to beat the dust out — that he took 
it ‘under a lamp to look at it — that he poked bits of 
stick into the lock to clear it — that he peeped into the 
key-hole, first with one eye, and then with the other — 
that he tried the key again — that he couldn’t turn it, 
and what was worse couldn’t get it out — that he bent it 
— that then it was much less disposed to come out than 
before — that he gave it a mighty twist and a great pull, 
and then it came out so suddenly that he staggered back- 
wards — that he kicked the door — that he shook it — 
finally, that he smote his forehead, and sat down on the 
$tep in despair. 

When this crisis had arrived. Miss Miggs, affecting to 


116 


BARIS ABY RUDGE. 


be exhausted with terror, and tolling to the window-siil 
for support, put out her nightcap, and demanded in a 
faint voice who was there. 

Mr. Tappertit cried “ Hush ! ” and, backing into the 
road, exhorted her in frenzied pantomime to secrecy and 
silence. : 

“ Tell me one thing,” said Miggs. “ Is it thieves ? ” ^ 

“ No — no — no ! ” cried Mr. Tappertit. 

“Then,” said Miggs, more faintly than before, “it’s 
fire. Where is it, sir? It’s near this room, I know. 
I’ve a good conscience, sir, and would much rather die 
than go down a ladder. All I wish is, respecting my love 
to my.married sister. Golden Lion Court, number twenty- 
sivin, second bell-handle on the right hand door-post.” 

“ Miggs ! ” cried Mr. Tappertit, “ don’t you know me ? 
Sim, you know — Sim ” — 

“ Oh ! what about him ! ” cried Miggs, clasping her 
hands. “ Is he in any danger ? Is he in the midst of 
flames and blazes ! Oh gracious, gracious ! ” 

“ Why I’m here, a’n’t I ? ” rejoined Mr. Tappertit, 
knocking himself on the breast. “ Don’t you see me ? 
What a fool you are, Miggs ! ” 

“ There ! ” cried Miggs, unmindful of this compliment. 
“Why — so it — Goodness, what is the meaning of — 
If you please mim here’s” — ^ 

“ No, no ! ” cried Mr. Tappertit, standing on tiptoe, 
as if by that means he, in the street, were any nearer 
being able to stop the mouth of Miggs in the garret. 

“ Don’t ! — I’ve been out without leave, and something 
3r another’s the matter with the lock. Come down, and 
undo the shop-window, that I may get in that way.” 

“ I dursn’t do it, Simmun,” cried Miggs — for that 
was her pronunciation of his Christian name. “ I dursn’t 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


117 


do it, indeed. You know as well as anybody, how par- 
ticular I am. And to come down in the dead of night, 
when the house is wrapped in slumbers and weil'ed in 
obscurity.” And there she stopped' and shivered, for her 
modesty caught cold at the very thought. 

“But Miggs,” cried Mr. Tappertit, getting under the 
lamp, that she might see his eyes. “ My darling 
Miggs 

Miggs screamed slightly. 

— “ That I love so much, and never can help thinking 
of,” and it is impossible to describe the use he made of 
his eyes when he said this — “do — for my sake, do.” 

“ Oh Simmun,” cried Miggs, “ this is worse than all. 
I know if I come down, you’ll go, and ” — 

“ And what, my precious ! ” said Mr. Tappertit. 

“ And try,” said Miggs, hysterically, “ to kiss me, or 
some such dreadfulness ; I know you will ! ” 

“ I swear I won’t,” said Mr. Tappertit, with remark- 
able earnestness. “ Upon my soul I won’t. It’s getting 
broad day, and the watchman’s waking up.- Angelic 
Miggs ! If you’ll only come and let me in, I promise 
you faithfully and truly I won’t.” 

Miss Miggs, whose gentle heart was touched, did not 
wait for the oath (knowing how strong the temptation 
was, and fearing he might forswear himself), but tripped 
lightly down the stairs, and with her own fair hands drew 
back the rough fastenings of the workshop window. 
Having helped the wayward ’prentice in, she faintly 
ai ticulated the w^ords “ Simmun is safe ! ” and yielding 
^o her woman’s nature, immediately became insensible. 

“ I knew I should quench her,” said Sim, rather em- 
barrassed by this circumstance. “ Of course I was cer- 
tain it would come to this, but there was nothing else to 


118 


BARNABY RUDGE, 


be clone — it I hadn’t eyed her over, she <vouldn’t have 
come down. Here. Keep up a minute, Miggs. What 
a slippery figure she is! There’s no holding her, com- 
Ibrtably. Do keep up a minute, Miggs, will you ? ” 

As Miggs, however, was deaf to all entreaties, Mr. 
Pappertit leant her against the wall as one might dis- 
f )ose of a walking-stick or umbrella, until he had secured, 
the window, when he took her in his arms again, and, in 
short stages and with great difficulty — arising mainly 
from her being tall and his being short, and perhaps in 
some degree from that peculiar physical conformation on 
which he had already remarked — carried her up-stairs, 
and planting her in the same umbrella or walking-stick 
fashion, just inside her own door, left her to her repose. 

“ He may be as cool as he likes,” said Miss Miggs, re- 
covering as soon as she was left alone ; “ but I’m in hia 
confidence and he can’t help himself nor couldn’t ii hi 
was twenty Simmunses I ” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


119 


CHAPTER X 

It was on one of those mornings, common in early 
spring, when the year, fickle and changeable in its youth 
like all other created things, is undecided whether to 
step backward into winter or forward into summer, and 
in its uncertainty inclines now to the one and now to the 
other, and now to both at once — wooing summer in the 
sunshine, and lingering still with winter in the shade — 
it was, in short, on one of those mornings, when it is hot 
and cold, , wet and dry, bright and lowering, sad and 
cheerful, withering and genial, in the compass of one 
short hour, that old John Willet, who was dropping 
asleep over the copper boiler, was roused by the sound 
of a horse’s feet, and glancing out at window, beheld a 
traveller of goodly promise checking his bridle at the 
Maypole door. 

He was none of your flippant young fellows, who would 
call for a tankard of mulled ale, and make themselves as 
much at home as if they had ordered a hogshead of wine ; 
none of your audacious young swaggerers, who would 
even penetrate^ into the bar — that solemn sanctuary — 
and, smiting old John upon the back, inquire if there was 
never a pretty girl in the house, and where he hid his 
little chambermaids, with a hundred other impertinences 
of that nature ; none of your free-and-easy companions, 
who world scrfipe their boots upon the fire-dogs in the 
common room, and be not at all particular on the subject 


120 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


of spittoons ; none of your unconscionable blades, requir- 
ing impossible chops, and taking unheard-of pickles for 
granted. He was a staid, grave, placid gentleman, some- 
thing past the prime of life, yet upright in his carriage,* 
for all that, and slim as a grayhound. He was well- 
mounted upon a sturdy chestnut cob, and had the grace- 
ful seat of an experienced horseman ; while his riding 
gear, though free from such fopperies as were then in 
vogue, was handsome and well chosen. He wore a 
riding-coat of a somewhat brighter green than might 
have been expected to suit the taste of a gentleman of 
his years, with a short, black, velvet cape, and laced 
pocket-holes and cuffs, all of a jaunty fashion ; his linen, 
too, was of the finest kind, worked in a rich pattern at 
the wrists and throat, and scrupulously white. Although 
he seemed, judging from the mud he had picked up on 
the way, to have come from London, his horse was as 
smooth and cool as his own iron-gray periwig and pig- 
tail. Neither man nor beast had turned a single hair ; 
and, saving for his soiled skirts and spatterdashes, this 
gentleman with his blooming face, white teeth, exactly- 
ordered dress, and perfect calmness, might have come 
from making an ►elaborate and leisurely toilet, to sit for 
an equestrian portrait at old John Willet’s gate. 

It must not be supposed that John observed these 
several characteristics by other than very slow degrees, 
or that he took in more than half a one at a time, or 
that he even made up his mind upon that, without a 
great deal of very serious consideration. Indeed, if he 
had been distracted in the first instance by question- 
ings and orders, it would have taken him at the least a 
fortnight to have noted what is here set down ; but it 
happened that the gentleman, being struck with the old 


BARNABY RUDGE^ 


121 


house, or with the plump pigeons which were skimming 
and courtesying about it, or with the tall maypole, on the 
top of which a weathercock, which had been out of order 
for fifteen years, performed a perpetual walk to the 
music of its own creaking, sat for some little time look- 
ing round in silence. Hence John, standing with his 
hand upon the horse’s bridle, and his great eyes on the 
rider, and with nothing passing to divert his thoughts, 
had really got some of these little circumstances into 
his brain, by the time he was called upon to speak. 

“ A quaint place this,” said the gentleman — and his 
voice was as rich as his dress. “ Are you the land- 
lord ? ” 

“ At your service, sir,” replied John Willet. 

“ You can give my horse good stabling, can you, and 
me an early dinner (I am not particular what, so that it 
be cleanly served), and a decent room — of which there 
seems to be no lack in this great mansion,” said the 
stranger, again running his eyes over the exterior. 

“ You can have, sir,” returned John, with a readiness 
quite surprising, “ anything you please.” 

“It’s well I am easily satisfied,” returned the other 
with a smile, “ or that might prove a hardy pledge, my 
friend.” And saying so, he dismounted, with the aid 
of the block before the door, in a twinkling. 

“ Halloa there ! Hugh ! ” roared John. “ I ask your 
pardon, sir, for keeping you standing in the porch ; bu 
my son has gone to town on business, and the boy being 
as I may say, of a kind of use to me, I’m rather put 
out when he’s away. Hugh ! — a dreadful idle vagrant 
fellow, sir — half a gypsy, as I think — always sleep- 
ing in the sun in summer, and in the straw in winter 
ume, sir — Hugh ! Dear Lord, to keep a gentleman a- 


122 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


waiting here, through him! — Hugh I I wish tliat chap 
was dead, I do indeed.” 

“ Possibly he is,” returned the other. “ I should think 
if he were living, he would have heard you by this 
time.” 

“ In his fits of laziness, he sleeps so desperate hard,” 
said the distracted host, “ that if you were to fire off 
cannon-balls into his ears, it wouldn’t wake him, sir.” 

The guest made no remark upon this novel cure for 
drowsiness, and recipe for making people lively, but 
with his hands clasped behind him, stood in the porch, 
apparently very much amused to see old John, with the 
bridle in his hand, wavering between a strong impulse 
to abandon the animal to his fate, and a half disposi- 
tion to lead him into the house, and shut him up in 
the parlor, while he waited on his master. 

“ Pillory the fellow, here he is at last I ” cried John 
in the very height and zenith of his distress. “ Did 
you hear me a-calling, villain ? ” 

The figure he addressed made no answer, but putting 
his hand upon the saddle, sprung into it at a bound, 
turned the horse’s head towards the stable, and was gone 
in an instant. 

“ Brisk enough when he is awake,” said the guest. 

“ Brisk enough, sir I ” replied John, looking at the 
place where the horse had been, as if not yet under- 
standing quite, what had become of him. “ He melts, 
I think. He goes like a drop of froth. You look at 
nitn and there he is. You look at him again, and — 
there he isn’t.” 

Having, in the absence of any more words, put this 
sudden climax to what he had faintly intended should 
be a long explanation of the whole life and character 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


123 


af his man, the oracular John Willet led the genlleinan 
up his wide dismantled staircase into the Maypole’s best 
apartment. 

It was spacious enough in all conscience, occupying 
the whole depth of the house, and having at either end 
a great bay window, as large as many modern rooms ; 
in which some few panes of stained glass, emblazoned 
with fragments of armorial bearings, though cracked, 
and patched, and shattered, yet remained ; attesting, by 
their presence, that the former owner had made the very 
light subservient to his state, and pressed the sun itself 
into his list of flatterers ; bidding it, when it shone into 
his chamber, reflect the badges of his ancient family, and 
take new hues and colors from their pride. 

But those were old days, and now every little ray 
came and went as it would; telling the plain, bare search- 
ing truth. Although the best room of the inn, it had the 
melancholy aspect of grandeur in decay, and was much 
too vast for comfort. *Rich rustling hangings, waving 
on the walls ; and, better far, the rustling of youth and 
beauty’s dress ; the light of w'omen’s eyes, outshining the 
tapers and their own rich jewels ; the sound of gentle 
tongues, and music, and the tread of maiden feet, had 
once been there, and filled it with delight. But they 
were gone, and with them all its gladness. It was no 
longer a home ; children were never born and bred 
there ; the fireside had become mercenary — a some- 
thing to be bought and sold — a very courtezan ; let who 
would die, or sit beside, or leave it, it was still the same 
^ it missed nobody, cared for nobody, had equal warmth 
and smiles for all. God help the man whose heart ever 
changes with the world, as an old mansion when it be- 
comes an inn ! 


124 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


No effort had been made to furnish this chilly waste, 
but before the broad chimney a colony of chairs and 
tables had been planted on a square of carpet, flanked 
by a ghostly screen, enriched with figures, grinning and 
grotesque. After lighting with his own hands the fag- 
ots which were heaped upon the hearth, old John with 
drew to hold grave council with his cook, touching tiie 
stranger’s entertainment; while the guest himself, seeing 
small comfort in the yet unkindled wood, opened a lat- 
tice in the distant window, and basked in a sickly gleam 
of cold March sun. 

Leaving the window now and then, to rake the crack- 
ling logs together, or pace the echoing room from end to 
end, he closed it when the fire was quite burnt up, and 
having wheeled the easiest chair into the warmest corner, 
summoned John Willet. 

“ Sir,” said John. 

He wanted pen, ink, and paper. There was an old 
standish on the high mantle-shelf containing a dusty 
apology for all three. Having set this before him, the 
landlord was retiring, when he motioned him to stay. 

“ There’s a house not far from here,” said the guest 
when he had written a few lines, “ which you call the 
Warren, I believe?” 

As this was said in the tone of one who knew the 
fact, and asked the question as a thing of course, John 
contented himself with nodding his head in the affirma- 
tive ; at the same time taking one hand out of his 
pockets to cough behind, and then putting it in again. 

“ 1 want this note ” — said the guest, glancing on 
what he had written, and folding it, “ conveyed there 
■»vithout loss of time, and an answer brought back here. 
Have you a messenger at hand ? ” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


125 


John was thoughtful for a minute or thereabouts, and 
then said Yes. 

“ Let me see him,” said the guest. 

This was disconcerting ; for Joe being out, and Hugh 
engaged in rubbing down the chestnut cob, be designed 
sending on the errand, Bamaby, who had just then ar- 
rived in one of his rambles, and who, so that he thought 
himself employed on grave and serious business, would 
go anywhere. 

“Why, the truth is,” said John after a long pause, 
“ that the person who’d go quickest, is a sort of natural, 
as one may say, sir ; and though quick of foot, and as 
much to be trusted as the post itself, he’s not good at 
talking, being touched and flighty, sir.” 

“ You don’t,” said the guest, raising his eyes to John’s 
fat face, “ you don’t mean — what’s the fellow’s name — 
you don’t mean Barnaby ? ” 

“ Yes I do,” returned the landlord, his features turning 
quite expressive with surprise. 

“ How comes he to be here ? ” inquired’ the guest, lean- 
ing back in his chair ; speaking in the bland, even tone, 
from which he never varied ; and with the same soft, 
courteous, never-changing smile upon his face. “ I saw 
him in London last night.” 

“ He’s, forever, here one hour, and there the next,” 
returned old John, after the usual pause to get the ques- 
tion in his mind. “ Sometimes he walks, and sometimes 
runs. He’s known along the road by everybody, arid 
sometimes comes here in a cart or chaise, and sometimes 
riding double. He comes and goes, through wind, rain, 
snow, and hail, and on the darkest nights. Nothing 
hurts himy 

“ He goes often to this Warren, does he not ? ” said 


126 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


the guest carelessly. “ I seem to remember his mother 
tellmg me something to that eflfect yesterday. But I was 
nojt attending to the good woman much.” 

“ You’re right, sir,” John made answer, “ he does. 
ITis father, sir, was murdered in that house.” 

“ So I have heard,” returned the guest, taking a gold 
toothpick from his pocket with the same sweet smile. 
“ A very disagreeable circumstance for the family.” 

“ Very,” said John with a puzzled .look, as if it oc- 
curred to him, dimly and afar off, that this might by pos- 
sibility be a cool way of treating the subject. 

“ All the circumstances after a murder,” said the guest 
soliloquizing, “ must be dreadfully unpleasant — so much 
bustle and disturbance — no repose — a constant dwell- 
ing upon one subject — and the running in and out, and 
up and down stairs, intolerable. I wouldn’t have such 
a thing happen to anybody I was nearly interested in, on 
any account. ’T would be enough to wear one’s life out. 
— You were going to say, friend ” — he added, turning 
to John again. 

“ Only that Mrs. Budge lives on a little pension from 
the family, and that Barnaby’s as free of the house as 
any cat or dog about it,” answered John. “ Shall he do 
your errand sir ? ” 

“ Oh yes,” replied the guest. “ Oh certainly. Let 
him do it by all means. Please to bring him here that 
I may charge him to be quick. If he objects to come 
you may tell him it’s Mr. Chester.’ He will remem- 
ber my name I dare say.” 

John was so very much astonished to find who his 
visitor was, that he could express no astonishment at all, 
Dy looks or otherwise, but left the room as if he were in 
the most placid and imperturbable of all possible con- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


127 


ditions. It has been reported that when he got down- 
stairs, he looked steadily at the boiler for ten minutes by 
the clock, and all that time never oncer left off shaking 
his head ; for which statement there would seem to be 
some ground of truth and feasibility, inasmuch as that 
interval of time did certainly elapse, before he returned 
with Barnaby to the guest’s apartment. 

“ Come hither lad,” said Mr. Chester. You know 
Mr. Geoffrey Hared ale ? ” 

Barnaby laughed, and looked at the landlord as though 
he would say, “ You hear him ? ” John, who was greatly 
shocked at this breach of decorum, clapped his finger to 
his nose, and shook his head in mute remonstrance. 

He knows him, sir,” said John, frowning aside at 
Barnaby, “ as well as you or I do.” 

“ I haven’t the pleasure of much acquaintance with 
the gentleman,” returned his guest. “ You may have. 
Limit the comparison to yourself, my friend.” 

Although this was said with the same easy affability, 
and the same smile, John felt himself put down, and lay- 
ing the indignity at Barnaby’s door, determined to kick 
his raven, on the very first opportunity. 

“ Give that,” said the guest, who had by thi } time 
sealed the note, and who beckoned his messenger tow- 
ards him as he spoke, “ into Mr. Haredale’s own hands. 
Wait for an answer, and bring it back to me — here. 
If you should find that Mr. Haredale is engaged just 
now, tell him — can he remember a message, land- 
lord ? ” 

“ When he chooses, sir,” replied John. “ He won’t 
forget this one.” 

" How are you sure of that ? ” 

John merely pointed to him as he stood with his head 


128 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


bent forward, and his earnest gaze fixed closely on his 
questioner’s fiice ; and nodded sagely. 

“ Tell him then, Barnaby, should he be engaged,” said 
Mr. Chester, “ that I shall be glad to wait his conven- 
ience here, and to see him (if he will call) at any time 
this evening. — At the worst I can have a bed here, 
Willet, I suppose ? ” 

Old John, immensely flattered by the personal noto- 
riety implied in this familiar form of address, answered, 
with something like a knowing look, “ I should believe 
you could, sir,” and was turning over in his mind various 
forms of eulogium, with the view of selecting one appro- 
priate to the qualities of his best bed, when his ideas 
were put to flight by Mr. Chester giving Barnaby the 
letter, and bidding him make all speed away. 

“ Speed ! ” said Barnaby, folding the little packet in 
his breast, “ Speed ! If you want to see hurry and mys- 
tery, come here. Here I ” 

With that, he put his hand, very much to John Willet’s 
horror, on the guest’s fine broadcloth sleeve, and led him 
stealthily to the back window. 

“ Look down there,” he said softly ; “ do you mark 
how they whisper in each other’s ears ; then dance and 
leap, to make believe they are in sport? Do you see 
how they stop for a moment, when they think there is no 
one looking, and mutter among themselves again ; and 
then how they roll and gambol, delighted with the mis- 
chief they’ve been plotting ? Look at ’em now. See 
how they whirl and plunge. And now they stop again, 
and whisper cautiously together — little thinking, mind, 
Low often I have lain upon the grass and watched them, 
I say — what is it that they plot and hatch ? Do you 
know' ? ” 




BARNABY RUDGE. 


129 


“ They are only clothes,” returned the guest, “ such 
as we wear ; hanging on those lines to dry, and fluttering 
in the wind.” 

“Clothes!” echoed Barnaby, looking 'close into his 
face, and falling quickly back. “ Ha ha ! Why, how 
much better to be silly, than as wise as you I You don’t 
see shadowy people there, like those that live in sleep — 
not you. Nor eyes in the knotted panes of glass, nor 
swift ghosts when it blows hard, nor do you hear voices 
in the air, nor see men stalking in the sky — not you ! 
I lead a merrier life than you, with all your cleverness. 
You’re the dull men. We’re the bright ones. Ha ! ha 1 
I’ll not change with you, clever as you are, — not I ! ” 

With that, he waved his hat above his head, and 
darted off. 

“ A strange creature, upon my word 1 ” said the guest, 
pulling out a handsome box, and taking a pinch of snuff. 

“ He wants imagination,” said Mr. Willet, very slowly 
and after a long silence ; “ that’s what he wants. I’ve 
tried to instil it into him, many and many’s the time ; 
but ” — John added this, in confidence — “ he a’n’t made 
for it ; that’s the fact.” 

To record that Mr. Chester smiled at John’sv remark 
would be little to the purpose, for he preserved the same 
conciliatory and pleasant look at all times. He drew his 
chair nearer to the fire though, as a kind of hint that he 
would prefer to be alone, and John, having no reasonable 
excuse for remaining, left him to himself. 

Very thoughtful old John Willet was, while the dinner 
was preparing ; and if his brain were ever less clear at 
one time than another, it is but reasonable to suppose 
that he addled it in no slight degree by shaking his head 
60 much that day. That Mr. Chester, between whom 

VOL. I. 9 


130 


BARXABY BUDGE. 


and Mr. Haredale, it was notorious to all the neighbor- 
hood, a deep and bitter animosity existed, should come 
down there for the sole purpose, as it seemed, of seeing 
him, and should choose the Maypole for their place of 
meeting, and should send to him express, were stum- 
bling-blocks John could not overcome. The only re- 
source he had, was to consult the boiler, and wait im- 
patiently for Barnaby’s return. 

But Barnaby delayed beyond all ' precedent. The 
visitor’s dinner was served, removed, his wine was set, 
the fire replenished, the hearth clean swept ; the light 
waned without, it grew dusk, became quite dark, and 
still no Barnaby appeared. Yet, though John Willet 
was full of wonder and misgiving, his guest sat cross- 
legged in the easy-chair, to all appearance as little 
ruffled in his thoughts as in his dress — the same calm, 
easy, cool, gentleman, without a care or thought beyond 
his golden toothpick. 

“ Barnaby’s late,” John ventured to observe, as he 
placed a pair of tarnished candlesticks, some three feet 
high, upon the table, and snuffed the lights they held. 

“ He is rather so,” replied the guest, sipping his wine. 
“ He will not be much longer, I dare say.” 

John coughed, and raked the fire together. 

“ As your roads bear no very good character, if I may 
judge from my son’s mishap, though,” said Mr. Chester, 
“ and as I have no fancy to be knocked on tlfb head — 
which is not only disconcerting at the moment, but places 
one, besides, in a ridiculous position with respect to the 
people who chance to pick one up — I shall stop here to- 
night. I think you said you had a bed to spare.” 

“ Such a bed, sir,” returned John Willet ; “ ay, such 
a bed as few, even of the gentry’s houses, own. A fixter 


BAKNABY RUDGE. 


I'M 

here, sir. I’ve heard say that bedstead is nigh two liun- 
dred years of age. Your noble son — a fine young 
gentleman — slept in it last, sir, half a year ago.” 

“ Upon my life, a recommendation ! ” said the guest, 
shrugging his shoulders and wheeling his chair nearer to 
I he fire. “ See that it be well aired, Mr. Willet, and let 

blazing fire be lighted there at once. This house is 
something damp and chilly.” 

John raked the fagots up again, more from habit 
than presence of mind,' or any reference to this remark, 
and was about to withdraw, when a hounding step was 
heard upon the stair, and Barnaby came panting in. 

“ He’ll have his foot in the stirrup in an hour’s time,” 
he cried, advancing. “ He has been riding hard all day 
— has just come home — but will be in the saddle again 
as soon as he has eat and drank, to meet his loving 
friend.” 

“Was that his message ?” asked the visitor, looking 
*up, but without the smallest discomposure — or at least 
without the smallest show of any. 

“ All but the last words,” Barnaby rejoined. “ He 
meant those. I saw that, in his face.” 

“ This for your pains,” said the other, putting money 
in his hand, and glancing at him steadfastly. “ This foi 
your pains, sharp Barnaby.” 

“ For Grip, and me, and Hugh, to share among us,” 
he rejoined, putting it up, and nodding, as he counted it 
on his fingers. “Grip one, me two, Hugh three; the 
dog, the goat, the cats — well, we shall spend it pretty 
soon, I warn you. Stay. — Look. Do you wise men 
see nothing there, now ? ” 

He bent eagerly down on one knee, and gazed intently 
at the smoke, wl ich was rolling up the chimney in a 


132 


BARxXABY RUDGE. 


thick black cloud. John Willet, who appeared to con- 
sider himself particularly and chiefly referred to under 
the term wise men, looked that way likewise, and with 
great solidity of feature. 

“ Now, where do they go to, when they spring so fast 
up there,” asked Barnaby ; “ eh ? Why do they tread 
so closely on each other’s heels, and why are they al- 
ways in a hurry — which is what you blame me for, 
when I only take pattern by these busy folk about me. 
More of ’em ! catching to each other’s skirts ; and as fast 
as they go, others come ! What a merry dance it is ! I 
would that Grip and I could frisk like that ! ” 

“ What has he in that basket at his back ? ” asked the 
guest after a few moments, during which Barnaby was 
still bending down to look higher up the chimney, and 
earnestly watching the smoke. 

“In this?” he answered, jumping up, before John 
Willet could reply — shaking it as he spoke, and stoop- 
ing his head to listen. “ In this ! What is there here ? 
Tell him ! ” 

“ A devil, a devil, a devil ! ” cried a hoarse voice. 

“ Here’s money ! ” said Barnaby, chinking it in his 
hand, “ money for a treat. Grip ! ” 

“ Hurrah ! Hurrah ! Hurrah ! ” replied the raven, 
“ keep up your spirits. Never say die. Bow, wow, 
wow ! ” 

Mr. Willet, who appeared to entertain strong doubts 
whether a customer in a laced coat and fine linen could 
be supposed to have any acquaintance even with the ex- 
istence of such unpolite gentry as the bird claimed to be- 
long to, took Barnaby off at this juncture, with the view 
of preventing any other improper declarations, and quit- 
ted the room with his very best bow. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


133 


i 


CHAPTER XL 

There was great news that night for the regular 
Maypole customers, to each of whom, as he straggled 
in to occupy his allotted seat in the chimney-corner, 
John with a most impressive slowness of delivery, and in 
an apoplectic whisper, communicated the fact that Mr. 
Chester was alone in the large room up-stairs, and 
was w’aiting the arrival of Mr. Geoffrey Haredale, to 
whom he had sent a letter (doubtless of a threatening 
nature) by the hands of Barnaby, then and there present. 

For a little knot of smokers and solemn gossips, wdio 
had seldom any new topics of discussion, this was a per- 
fect Godsend. Here was a good, dark-looking mystery 
progressing under that very roof — brought home to the 
fireside as it were, and enjoyable without the smallest 
pains or trouble. It is extraordinary what a zest and 
relish it gave to the drink, and how it heightened the 
flavor of the tobacco. Every man smoked his pipe with 
a face of grave and serious delight, and looked at his 
neighbor with a sort of quiet congratulation. Nay, it 
was felt to be such a holiday and special night, that, on 
the motion of little Solomon Daisy, every man (includ- ' 
ing John himself) put down his sixpence for a can of 
(lip, which grateful beverage was brewed with all de- 
spatch, and set down in the midst of them on the brick 
floor ; both that it might simmer and stew before the fire, 
and that its fragrant steam, rising up among them and 


134 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


mixing with the wreaths of vapor from their pipes, 
» might shroud them in a delicious atmosphere of their 
own, and shut out all the world. The very furniture of 
the room seemed to mellow and deepen in its tone ; the 
ceiling and walls looked blacker and more highly pol- 
ished, the curtains of a ruddier red ; the fire burnt clear 
and high, and the crickets in the hearth-stone chirped 
with a more than wonted satisfaction. 

There were present two, however, who showed but 
little interest in the general contentment. Of these, one 
was Barnaby himself, who slept, or to avoid being beset 
with questions, feigned to sleep, in the chimney-corner ; 
the other, Hugh, who, sleeping too, lay stretched upon 
the bench on the opposite side, in the full glare of the 
blazing fire. 

The light that fell upon this slumbering form, showed 
it in all its muscular and handsome proportions. It was 
that of a young man, of a hale athletic figure, and a 
giant’s strength, whose sunburnt face and swarthy throat, 
overgrown with jet black hair, might have served a 
painter for a model. Loosely attired, in the coarsest 
and roughest garb, with scraps of straw and hay — his 
usual bed — clinging here and there, and mingling with 
his uncombed locks, he had fallen asleep in a posture as 
careless as his dress. The negligence and disorder of 
the w'hole man, wdth something fierce and sullen in his 
features, gave him a picturesque appearance, that at 
tracted the regards even of the Maypole customers who 
knew him w’ell, and caused Long Parkes to say that 
Hugh looked more like a poaching rascal to-night than 
ever he had seen him yet. 

“ He’s waiting here, I suppose,” said Solomon, “ to 
^ake Mr. Haredale’s horse.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


135 


“ That’s it, sir,” replied John Willet. “ He’s not often 
in the house, you know. He’s more at his ease among 
horses than men. I look upon him as a animal him- 
self.” 

Following up this opinion with a shrug that seemed 
meant to say, “ we can’t expect everybody to be like us,’' 
John put his pipe into his mouth again, and smoked like 
one who felt his superiority over the general run of man- 
kind. 

“ That chap, sir,” said John, taking it out again after a 
time, and pointing at him with the stem, “ though he’s 
got all his faculties about him — bottled up and corked 
down, if I may say so, somewheres or another ” — 

“ Very good ! ” said Parkes, nodding his head. “ A 
very good expression, Johnny. You’ll be a-tackling 
somebody presently. You’re in twig to-night, I see.” 

Take care,” said Mr. Willet, not at all grateful for 
the compliment, “ that I don’t tackle you, sir, which I 
shall certainly endeavor to do, if you interrupt me when 
I’m making observations. — That chap, I was a-saying, 
though he has all his faculties about him, somewheres or 
another, bottled up and corked down, has no more imagi- 
nation than Barnaby has. And why hasn’t he ? ” 

The three friends shook their heads at each other ; 
saying by that action, without the trouble of opening 
their lips, “ Do you observe what a philosophical mind 
our friend has ? ” 

“ Why hasn’t he ? ” said John, gently striking the 
‘able with his open hand. “ Because they was never 
Irawed out of him when he was a boy. That’s why. 
What would any of us have been, if our fathers hadn’t 
drawed our faculties out of us? What would my boy 
Joe have been, if I hadn’t drawed his faculties out 


136 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


of liim ? — Do you mind what I’m a-saying of, gen* 
tlemen ? ” ’ 

“ Ah ! we mind you,” cried Parkes. “ Go on im* 
proving of us, Johnny.” 

“ Consequently, then,” said Mr. Willet, “ that chap, 
whose mother was hung when he was a little boy, 
along with six others, for passing bad notes — and it’s 
a blessed thing to think how many people are hung in 
batches every six weeks for that, and such like of- 
fences, as showing how wide awake our government is 
— that chap was then turned loose, and had to mind 
cows, and frighten birds away, and what not, for a few 
’ pence to live on, and so got on by degrees to mind 
horses, and to sleep in course of time in lofts and . lit- 
ter, instead of under hay-stacks and hedges, till at last 
he come to be hostler at the Maypole for his board and 
lodging and a annual trifle — that chap that can’t read 
nor write, and has never had much to do with anything 
but animals, and has never lived in any way but like 
the animals he has lived among, is a animal. And,” 
said Mr. Willet, arriving at his logical conclusion, “ is 
to be treated accordingly.” 

“ Willet,” said Solomon Daisy, who had exhibited 
some impatience at the intrusion of so unworthy a 
subject on their more interesting theme, “ when Mr. 
Chester come this morning, did he order the large 
room ? ” 

“ He signified, sir,” said John, “ that he wanted a 
large apartment. Yes. Certainly.” 

“ Why then. I’ll tell you what,” said Solomon, speak- 
ing softly and with an earnest look. “ He and Mr. 
Haredale are going to fight a duel in it.” 

Everybody looked at Mr. Willet, after this alarming 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


137 


suggestion. Mr. Willet looked at the fire, weighing in 
his own mind the effect which such an occurrence would 
be likely to have on the establishment. 

“ Well,” said John, “I don’t know — I am sure — I 
remember that when I went up last, he had put the 
lights upon the mantle-shelf.” 

“ It’s as plain,” returned Solomon, “ as the nose on 
Parkes’s face ” — Mr. Parkes, who had a large nose, 
rubbed it, and looked as if he considered this a per- 
sonal allusion — “ they’ll fight in that room. You 
know by the newspapers what a common thing it is 
for gentlemen to fight in coffee-houses without seconds. 
One of ’em will be wounded or perhaps killed in this 
house.” 

“ That was a challenge that Barnaby took then, eh ? ” 
said John. 

— “ Enclosing a slip of paper with the measure of his 
sword upon it. I’ll bet a guinea,” answered the little 
man. “We know what sort of gentleman Mr. Hare- 
dale is. You have told us what Barnaby said about his 
looks, when he came back. Depend upon it, I’m right. 
Now, mind.” 

The flip had had no flavor till now. The tobacco 
had been* of mere English growth, compared with its 
present taste. A duel in that great old rambling room 
up-stairs, and the best bed ordered already for the 
wounded man ! 

“Would it be swords or pistols now?” said John. 

“ Heaven knows. Perhaps both,” returned Solomon. 
“ The gentlemen wear swords, and may easily have pis- 
tols in their pockets — most likely have, indeed. If 
they fire at each other without effect, then they’ll draw, 
and go to work in earnest.” 


138 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


A shade passed over Mr. Willet’s face as he thought 
of broken windows and disabled furniture, but be- 
thinking himself that one of the parties would proba- 
bly be left alive to pay the damage, he brightened up 
again. , 

“ And then,” said Solomon, looking from face to 
face, “ then we shall have one of those stains upon 
the floor that never come out. If Mr. Haredale wins, 
depend upon it, it’ll be a deep one ; or if he loses, 
it will perhaps be deeper still, for he’ll never give 
in unless he’s beaten down. We know him better, 
eh ? ” 

“ Better indeed ! ” they whispered all together. 

“ As to its ever being got out again,” said Solomon, 
“ I tell you it never will, or can be. Why, do you 
know that it has been tried, at a certain house we are 
acquainted with ? ” 

“ The Warren ! ” cried John. “ No, sure ! ” 

“ Yes, sure — yes. It’s only known by very few. 
It has been whispered about though, for all that. They 
planed the board away, but there it was. They went 
deep, but it went deeper. They put new boards down, 
but there was one great spot that came through still, 
and showed itself in the old place. And — harkye — 
draw nearer — Mr. Geoffrey made that room his study, 
and sits there, always, with his foot (as I have heard) 
upon it; and he believes through thinking of it long 
and very much, that it will never fade until he finds 
the man who did the deed.” 

As this recUal ended, and they all drew closer round 
the fire, the tramp of a horse was heard without. 

“ The very man ! ” cried, John, starting up. “ Hugh . 
Hugh ! ” 


BAllNABY RUDGE. 


139 


The sleeper staggered to his feet, and hurried after 
him. John quickly returned, ushering in with great 
attention and deference (for Mr. Haredale was his 
landlord) the long expected visitor, who strode into 
the room clanking his heavy boots upon the floor 
and looking keenly round upon the bowing group, 
raised his hat in acknowledgment of their profound 
respect. 

“ You have a stranger here, Willet, who sent to me,” 
he said, in a voice which sounded naturally stern and 
deep. “ Where is he ? ” 

“ In the great room up-stairs, sir,” answered John. 

“ Show the way. Your staircase is dark, I know. 
Gentlemen, good-night.” 

With that, he signed to the landlord to go on be- 
fore ; and went clanking out, and up the stairs ; old 
John, in his agitation, ingeniously lighting everything 
but the way, and making a stumble at every second 
step. 

“ Stop ! ” he said, when they reached the landing. 
“ 1 can announce myself. Don’t wait.” 

He laid his hand upon the door, entered, and shut 
it heavily. Mr. Willet was by no means disposed to 
stand there listening by himself, especially as ^e walla 
were very thick ; so descended with much greater 
alacrity than he had come up, and joined his friends 
below. 


140 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


CHAPTER XII. 

There was a brief pause in the state-room of the 
Maypole, as Mr. Haredale tried the lock to satisfy 
himself that he had shut the door securely, and, strid- 
ing up the dark chamber to where the screen 'enclosed 
a little patch of light and warmth, presented himself, 
abruptly and in silence, before the smiling guest. 

If the two had no greater sympathy in their inward 
thoughts than in their outward bearing and appearance, 
the meeting did not seem likely to prove a very calm 
or pleasant one. With no great disparity between them 
in point of years, they were in every other respect, as 
unlike and far removed from each other as two men 
could well be. The one was soft-spoken, delicately 
made, precise, and elegant ; the other, a burly square- 
built man, negligently dressed, rough and abrupt in 
manner, stern, and, in his present mood, forbidding both 
in look find speech. The one preserved a calm and 
placid smile ; the other a distrustful frown. The new- 
X)mer, indeed, appeared bent on showing by his every 
:one and gesture his determined opposition and hostility 
0 the man he had come to meet. The guest who re- 
ceived him, on the other hand, seemed to feel that the 
contrast between them was all in his favor, and to de- 
rive a quiet exultation from it which put him more at 
his ease than ever. 

“ Haredale,” said this gentleman, without the least 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


141 


fcppearance of embarrassment or reserve, “ 1 am very 
glad to see you.” 

“ Let us dispense with compliments. They are mis- 
placed between us,” returned the other, waving his 
hand, “ and say plainly what we have to say. You 
have asked me to meet you. I am here. Why do 
we stand face to face again ? ” 

“Still the same frank and sturdy character, I see!” 

“ Good or bad, sir, I am,” returned the other, leaning 
his arm upon the chimney-piece, and turning a haughty 
look upon the occupant of the easy-chair, “ the man I 
used to be. I have lost no old likings or dislikings ;* 
my memory has not failed me by a hair’s-breadth. You 
ask me to give you a meeting. I say, I am here.” 

“ Our meeting, Haredale,” said Mr. Chester, tapping 
his snuffbox, and following with a smile the impatient 
gesture he had made — perhaps unconsciously — tow- 
ards his sword, “ is one of conference and peace, I 
hope ? ” 

“ I have come here,” returned the other, “ at your de- 
sire, holding myself bound to meet you, when and where 
you would. I have not come to bandy pleasant speeches, 
or hollow professions. You are a smooth man of the 
world, sir, and at such play have me at a disffdvantage. 
The very last man on this earth with whom I would 
enter the lists to combat with gentle compliments and 
masked faces, is Mr. Chester, I do assure you. I am not 
his match at such weapons, and have reason to believe 
that few men are.” 

“ You do me a great deal of honor, Haredale,” re- 
turned the other, most composedly, “ and I thank you. I 
will be frank with you ” — 

“ I beg your pardon — will be what ? ” 


142 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Frank — open — perfectly candid.” 

“ Hah ! ” cried Mr. Haredale, drawing in his breath, 
“ But don’t let me interrupt you.” 

“ So resolved am I to hold this course,” returned the 
other, tasting his wine with great deliberation, “ that I 
have determined not to quarrel with you, and not to be 
betrayed into a warm expression or a hasty word.” 

“ There again,” said Mr. Haredale, “ you will have 
mo at a great advantage. Your self-command ” — 

“ Is not to be disturbed, when it will serve my purpose, 
you would say,” — rejoined the other, interrupting him 
with the same complacency. “ Granted. I allow it. 
And I have a purpose to serve now. So have you. 
I am sure our object is the same. Let us attain it 
like sensible men, who have ceased to be boys some 
time. — Do you drink ? ” 

“ With my friends,” returned the other. 

“ At least,” said Mr. Chester, “ you will be seated ? ” 

“ I will stand,” returned Mr. Haredale, impatiently, 
“ on this dismantled beggared hearth, and not pollute 
it, fallen as it is, with mockeries. Go on ! ” 

“You are wrong, Haredale,” said the other, crossing 
his legs, and smiling as he held his glass up in the bright 
glow of the fire. “ You are really very wrong. The 
world is a lively place enough, in which we must accom- 
modate ourselves to circumstances, sail with the stream 
as glibly as we can,, be content to take froth for sub- 
stance, the surface for the depth, the counterfeit for the 
real coin. I wonder no philosopher has ever established 
Hiat our globe itself is hollow. It should be, if Nature 
is consistent in her works.” 

“ You think it is, perhaps ? ” 

“ I should say,” he returned, sipping his wine, “ there 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


143 


could be no doubt about it. Well ; we, in our trilling 
with this jingling to}*^, have had the ill luck to jostle and 
fall out. We are not what the world calls friends; but 
we are as good and true and loving friends for all that, 
as nine out of every ten of those on whom it bestows 
the title. You have a niece, and I a son — a fine lad, 
Haredale, but foolish. They fall in love with each 
other, and form what this same world calls an attach- 
ment ; meaning a something fanciful and false like all 
the rest, which, if it took its own free time, would break 
like any other bubble. But it may nOt have its own free 
time — will not, if they are left alone — and the ques- 
tion is, shall we two, because society calls us enemies, 
stand aloof, and let them rush into each other’s arms, 
when, by approaching each other sensibly, as we do now, 
we can prevent it, and part them ? ” 

“ I love ray niece,” said Mr. Haredale, after a short 
silence. “ It may sound strangely in your ears ; but I 
love her.” 

“ Strangely, my good fellow ! ” cried Mr. Chester, 
lazily filling his glass again, and pulling out his tooth- 
pick. “ Not at all. I like Ned too — or, as you say, 
love him — that’s the word among such near relations. 
I’m very fond of Ned. He’s an amazingly good fellow, 
and a handsome fellow — foolish and weak as yet ; that’s 
all. But the thing is, Haredale — for I’ll be very frank, 
as I told you I would at first — independently of any dis- 
like that you and I might have to being related to each 
other, and independently of the religious differences be- 
tween us — and damn it, that’s important — I couldn’t 
afford a match of this description. Ned and I couldn’t 
do it. It’s impossible.” 

“ Curb your tongue, in God’s name, if this conversa- 


M4 


BARNABY EUDGE. 


tion is to last,” retorted Mr. Haredale fiercely. “ I have 
said I love my niece. Do you think that, loving her, 
I would have her fling her heart away on any man who 
liad your blood in his veins ? ” 

“ You see,” said the other, not at all disturbed, the 
advantage of being so frank and open. Just what I was 
about to add, upon my honor ! I am amazingly attached 
to Ned — quite doat upon him, indeed — and even if we 
could afford to throw ourselves away, that very objection 
would be quite insuperable. — I wish you’d take some 
wine.” 

“ Mark me,” said Mr. Haredale, striding to the table, 
and laying his hand upon it heavily. “ If any man be- 
lieves — presumes to think — that I, in word, or deed, 
or in the wildest dream, ever entertained remotely the 
idea of Emma Haredale’s favoring the suit of one who 
was akin to you — in any way — I care not what — he 
lies. He lies, and does me grievous wrong, in the mere 
thought.” 

“ Haredale,” returned the other, rocking himself to and 
fro as in assent, and nodding at the fire, “ it’s extremely 
manly, and really very generous in you to meet me in 
this unreserved and handsome way. Upon my word, 
those are exactly my sentiments, only expressed with 
much more force and power than I could use — you 
know my sluggish nature, and will forgive me, I am 
sure.” 

“ While I would restrain her from all correspondence 
with your son, and sever their intercourse here, though it 
should cause her death,” said Mr. Haredale, who had 
been pacing to and fro, “ I would do it kindly and ten- 
derly if I can. I have a trust to discharge which my 
nature is not formed to understand, and, for this rea- 


BARNA13Y RUDGE. 


Uii 

ion, the bare fact of there being any love between them 
comes upon me to-night, almost for thcr first time.” 

“ I am more delighted than I can possibly tell you,” 
rejoined Mr. Chester with the utmost blandness, “ to find 
my own impression so confirmed. You see the advan- 
tage of our having met. We understand each other. 
We quite agree. We have a most complete and 
thorough explanation, und we know what course to 
take. — Why don’t you taste your tenant’s wine ? It’s 
really very good.” 

“ Pray who,” said Mr. Haredale, “ have aided Emma, 
or your son ? Who are their go-betweens, and agents — 
do you know ? ” 

‘‘All the good people hereabouts — the neighboriiood 
in general, I think,” returned the other, with his most 
affable smile. “ The messenger 1 sent to you to-day, 
foremost among them all.” 

“ The idiot ? Barnaby ? ” 

“ You are surprised ? I am glad of that, for I was 
rather so myself. Yes. 1 wrung that from his mother 
— a very decent sort of woman — from whom, indeed, I 
chiefly learnt how serious the matter had become, and so 
determined to ride out here to-day, and hold a parley 
with you on this neutral ground. — You’re stouter than 
you used to be, Haredale, but you look extremely well.” 

“ Our business, I presume, is nearly at an end,” said 
Mr. Haredale, with an expression of impatience he was 
at no pains to conceal. “ Trust me, Mr. Chester, my 
niece shall change from this time. I will appeal,” he 
added in a lower tone, “ to her woman’s heart, her dig- 
nity, her pride, her duty” — 

“ I shall do the same by Ned,” said Mr. Chester, re- 
bloring some errant fagots to their places in the grate 
\OL. I. 10 


146 


BARNABY RUDGE 


with the toe of his boot. “ If there is anything real in 
the world, it is those amazingly fine feelings and those 
natural obligations which must subsist between father 
and son. I shall put it to him on every ground of 
moral and religious feeling. I shall represent to him 
that we cannot possibly afford it — that I have always 
looked forw'ard to his marrying well, for a genteel pro- 
vision for myself in the autumn of life — that there are 
a great many clamorous dogs to pay, whose claims are 
perfectly just and right, and who must -be paid out of 
his wife’s fortune. In short that the very highest and 
most honorable feelings of our nature, with every con- 
sideration of filial duty and affection, and all that sort of 
thing, imperatively demand that he should run away with 
an iieiress.” 

“ And break her heart as speedily as possible ” said 
Mr. Haredale, drawing on his glove. 

“ There Ned will act exactly as he pleases,” returned 
the other, sipping his wine ; “ that’s entirely his affair. 
I wouldn’t for the world interfere with my son, Hare- 
dale, beyond a certain point. The relationship between 
father and son, you know, is positively quite a holy kind 
of bond. — Wo?i'£ you let me persuade you to take one 
glass of wine ? Well ! as you please, as you please,” 
he added, helping himself again. 

“ Chester,” said Mr. Haredale, after a short silence, 
during which he had eyed his smiling face from time to 
time intently, “ you have the head and heart of an evil 
spirit in all matters of deception.” 

“ Your health ! ” said the other, with a nod. “ But I 
have interrupted you ” — 

“ If now,” pursued Mr. Haredale, “ we should find it 
difficult to separate these young people, and break off 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


147 


their intercourse — if, for instance, you find it difficult on 
your side, what course do you intend to take ? ” 

“ Nothing plainer, my good fellow, nothing easier,’* re- 
turned the other, shrugging his shoulders and stretching 
himself more comfortably before the fire. “ I shall then 
exert those powers on which you flatter me so highly — 
though, upon my word, I don’t deserve your compliments 
to their full extent — and resort to a few little trivial 
subterfuges for rousing jealousy and resentment. You 
see ? ” 

“In short, justifying the means by the end-, we are, 
as a last resource for tearing them asunder, to resort 
to treachery and — and lying,” said Mr. Haredale. 

“ Oh dear no. Fie, fie ! ” returned the other, relishing 
a pinch of sauflf extremely. “ Not lying. Only a little 
management, a little diplomacy, a little — intriguing, 
that’s the word.” 

“ I wish,” said Mr. Haredale, moving to and fro, and 
stopping, and moving on again, like one who was ill at 
ease, “ that this could have been foreseen or prevented. 
But as it has gone so far, and it is necessary for us to 
act, it is of no use shrinking or regretting. Well ! 1 
shall second your endeavors to the utmost of my power. 
There is one topic in the whole wide range of human 
thoughts on which we both agree. We shall act in con- 
cert, but apart. There will be no need, I hope, for us to 
meet again.” 

“ Are you going ? ” said Mr, Chester, rising with a 
graceful indolence. “ Let me light you down the 
stairs.” 

“ Pray keep your seat,” returned the other dryly, “ I 
Know the way.” So, waving his hand slightly, and put- 
ting on his hat as lie turned upon his heel, he went clank- 


148 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


ing out as he had come, shut the door behind him, and 
tramped down the echoing stairs. 

“ Pah ! A very coarse animal, indeed ! ” said Mr. 
Chester, composing himself in the easy-chair again. “ A 
rough brute. Quite a human badger!” 

John Willet and his friends, who had been listening 
intently for the clash of swords, or firing of pistols in the 
great room, and had indeed settled the order in which 
they should rush in when summoned — in which proces- 
sion old John had carefully arranged that he should bring 
up the rear — were very much astonished to see Mr. 
Haredale come dowm without a scratch, call for his horse, 
and ride away thoughtfully at a footpace. After some 
consideration, it was decided that he had left the gentle- 
man above, for dead, and had adopted this stratagem to 
divert suspicion or pursuit. 

As this conclusion involved the necessity of their going 
up-stairs forthwith, they were about to ascend in the 
order they had agreed upon, when a smart ringing at 
the guest’s bell, as if he had pulled it vigorously, over- 
threw all their speculations, and involved them in great 
uncertainty and doubt. At length Mr. Willet agreed to 
go up-stairs himself, escorted by Hugh and Barnaby, as 
the strongest and stoutest fellows on the premises, who 
were to make their appearance under pretence of clear- 
ing away the glasses. 

Under this protection, the brave and broad-faced John 
boldly entered the room-, half a foot in advance, and re- 
ceived an order for a boot-jack without trembling. But 
when it was brought, and he leant his sturdy shoulder to 
the guest, Mr. Willet was observed to look very hard 
into his boots as he pulled them off, and, by opening his 
eyes much wider than usual, to appear to express some 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


149 


surprise and disappointment at not finding them full of 
blood. He took occasion, too, to examine the gentleman 
as closely as he could, expecting to discover sundry loop- 
holes in his person, pierced by his adversary’s sword. 
Finding none, however, and observing in course of time 
that his guest was as cool and unrufiled, both in his dress 
and temper, as he had been all day, old John at last 
heaved a deep sigh, and began to think no duel had 
been fought that night. 

“ And now, Willet,” said Mr. Chester, “ if the room’s 
well aired. I’ll try the merits of that famous bed.” 

“ The room, sir,” returned John, taking up a candle, 
and nudging Barnaby and Hugh to accompany them, in 
case the gentleman should unexpectedly drop down faint 
or dead from some internal wound, “ the room’s as warm 
as any toast in a tankard. Barnaby, take you that other 
candle, and go on before. Hugh! Follow up, sir, with 
the easy-chair.” 

In this order — and still, in his earnest inspection, 
holding his handle very close to the guest ; now making 
him feel extremely warm about the legs, now threatening 
to set his wig on fire, and constantly begging his pardon 
with great awkwardness and embarrassment — John led 
the party to the best bedroom, which was nearly as large 
as the chamber from which they had come, and held, 
drawn out near the fire for warmth, a great old spectral 
bedstead, hung with faded brocade, and ornamented, at 
the top of each carved post, with a plume of feathers that 
had once been white, but with dust and age had now 
grown hearse-like and funereal. 

“ Good-night, my friends,” said Mr. Chester with a 
’Sweet smile, seating himself, when he had surveyed the 
room from end to end, in the easy-chair which his at- 


150 


BARNABY RUDGE, 


tendants wheeled before the fire. ‘‘ Good-night ! Bar- 
naby, my good fellow, you ‘say some prayers before you 
go to bed, I hope ? ” 

Barnaby nodded. “ He has some nonsense that he 
calls his prayers, sir,” returned old John, officiously. 
“I’m afraid there a’n’t much good in ’em.” 

“ And Hugh ? ” said Mr. Chester, turning to him. 

“ Not I,” he answered. “ I know his ” — pointing to 
Barnaby — “ they’re well enough. He sings ’em some- 
times in the straw. I listen.” 

“ He’s quite a animal, sir,” John whispered in his ear 
with dignity. “ You’ll excuse him. I’m sure. If he has 
any soul at all, sir, it must be such a very small one, that 
it don’t signify what he does or doesn’t in that way. 
Good-night, sir ! ” ' 

The guest rejoined “ God bless you ! ” with a fervor 
that was quite affecting ; and John, beckoning his guards 
to go before, bowed himself out of the room, and left him 
to his rest in the Maypole’s ancient bed. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


15J 


CHAPTER XIIL 

If Joseph Willet, the denounced and proscribed of 
'prentices, had happened to be at home when his father's 
courtly guest presented himself before the Maypole door 
— that is, if it had not perversely chanced to be one of 
the half dozen days in the whole year on which he was 
at liberty to absent himself for as many hours without 
question or reproach — he would have contrived, by 
hook or crook, to dive to the very bottom of Mr. Ches- 
ter’s mystery, and to come at his purpose with as much 
certainty as though he liad been his confidential adviser. 
In that fortunate case, the lovers would have had quick 
warning of the ills that threatened them, and the aid of 
various timely and wise suggestions to boot ; for all Joe’s 
readiness of thought and action, and all his sympathies 
and good wishes, were enlisted in favor of the young 
people, and were stanch in devotion to their cause. 
Whether this disposition arose out of his old preposses- 
sions in favor of the young lady, whose history had sur- 
rounded her in his mind, almost from his cradle, with 
circumstances of unusual interest ; or from his attach- 
nent towards the young gentleman, into whose confi- 
dence he had, through Iiis shrewdness and alacrity, 
and the rendering of sundry important services as a spy 
Rnd messenger, almost imperceptibly glided ; wliether 
they had their origin in either of these sources, or in the 
habit natural to youth^ or in the constant badgering and 


J52 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


w'orrjing of his venerable parent, or in any hidden little 
love-affair of his own which gave him something of a 
fellow-feeling in the matter, it is needless to inquire — 
especially as Joe was out of the way, and had no oppor- 
tunity on that particular occasion of testifying to his 
sentiments either on one side or the other. 

It was, in fact, the twenty-fifth of March, which, as 
most people know to their cost, is and has been time out 
of mind, one of those unpleasant epochs termed quarter- 
days. On this twenty-fifth of March, it was John Willetts 
pride annually to settle, in hard cash, his account with a 
certain vintner and distiller in the city of London; to 
give into whose hands a canvas bag containing its exact 
amount, and not a penny more or less, was the end and 
object of a journey for Joe, so surely as the year and 
day came round. 

This journey was performed upon an old gray mare, 
concerning whom John had an indistinct set of ideas 
hovering about him, to the effect that she could win a 
plate or cup if she tried. She never had tried, and 
probably never would now, being some fourteen or 
fifteen years of age, short in wind, long in body, and 
rather the worse for wear in respect of her mane and 
tail. Notwithstanding these slight defects, John per- 
fectly gloried in the animal ; and when she was brought 
round to the door by Hugh, actually retired into the 
bar, and there, in a secret grove of lemons, laughed with 
)ride. 

“ There’s a bit of horseflesh, Hugh ! ” said John, when 
he had recovered enough self-command to appear at the 
door again. “ There’s a comely creatur ! There’s high 
mettle ! There’s bone ! ” 

There was bone enough beyond all doubt ; and so 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


153 


Hugh seemed to think, as he sat sideways in the saddle, 
lazily doubled up with his chin nearly touching his 
knees ; and heedless of the dangling stirrups and loose 
bridle-rein, sauntered up and down on the little green 
before the door. 

“Mind you take good care of her, sir,” said John, 
appealing from this insensible person to his son and heir, 
who now appeared, fully equipped and ready. “ Don’t 
you ride hard.” 

“ I should be puzzled to do that, 1 think, father,” Joe 
replied, casting a disconsolate look at the animal. 

“ None of your impudence, sir, if you please,” retorted 
old John. “ What would you ride, sir ? A wild ass or 
zebra would be too tame for you, wouldn’t he, eh, sir? 
You’d like to ride a roaring lion, wouldn’t you, sir, eh, 
sir ? Hold your tongue, sir.” When Mr. Willet, in his 
differences with his son, had exhausted all the questions 
that occurred to him, and Joe had said nothing at all 
in answer, he generally wound up by bidding him hold 
his tongue. 

“ And what does the boy mean,” added Mr. Willet, 
after he had stared at him for a little time, in a species 
of stupefaction, “ by cocking his hat to such an extent ! 
A re you a-going to kill the wintner, sir ? ” 

“ No,” said Joe, tartly ; “ I’m not. Now your mind’s 
at ease, father.” 

“ With a milintary air, too ! ” said Mr. Willet, survey 
ing him from top to toe ; “ with a swaggering, fire-eating 
biling- water drinking sort of way with him ! And what 
ilo you mean by pulling up the crocuses and snowdrops, 
eh sir ? ” 

“ It’s only a little nosegay,” said Joe, reddening. 
“ There’s no harm in that, I hope ? ” 


154 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ You’re a boy of business, you are, sir ! ” said Mr. 
Willet, disdainfully, “ to go supposing that wintners care 
for nosegays.” 

“ I don’t suppose anything of the kind,” returned Joe. 
“ Let them keep their red noses for bottles and tank- 
rds. These are going to Mr. Varden’s house.” 

“And do you suppose he minds such things as cro- 
cuses ? ” demanded John. 

“I don’t know, and to say the truth, I don’t care,” 
said Joe. “ Come father, give me the money, and in the 
name of patience let me go.” 

“ There it is, sir,” replied John ; “ and take care of 
it ; and mind you don’t make too much haste back, but 
give the mare }i long rest. — Do you mind ? ” 

“ Ay, I mind,” returned Joe. “ She’ll need it. Heaven 
knows.” 

“ And don’t you score up too much at the Black Lion,” 
said John. •“ Mind that too.” 

“Then why don’t you let me have some money of 
my own ? ” retorted Joe, sorrowfully ; “ why don’t you, 
father? What do you send me into London for, giv- 
ing me only the right to call for my dinner at the Black 
Lion, which you’re to pay for next time you go, as if' 
I was not to be trusted with a few shillings ? Why 
do you use me like this ? It’s not right of you. You 
can’t expect me to be quiet under it.” 

“ Let him have money ! ” cried John in a drowsy 
revery. “ What does he call money — guineas ? Hasn’t 
he got money ? Over and above the tolls, hasn’t he one 
and sixpence ? ” 

“ One and sixpence ! ” repeated his son contemptu- 
ously. 

“Yes, sir,” returned John, “one and sixpence. When 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


155 


I was your age, I had never seen so much money, in 
a heap. A shilling of it is in case of accidents — the 
mare casting a shoe, or the like of that. The other 
sixpence is to spend in the diversions of London; and 
the diversion I recommend is going to the top of the 
Monument, and sitting there. There’s no temptation 
there, sir — no drink — no young women — no bad 
characters of any sort — nothing but imagination. That’s 
the way I enjoyed myself when I was your age, sir.” 

To this, Joe made no answer, but beckoning Hugh, 
leaped into the saddle and rode away ; and a very stal- 
wart, manly horseman he looked, deserving a better 
charger than it was his fortune to bestride. John stood 
staring after him, or rather after the gray mare (for he 
had no eyes for her rider), until man and beast had 
been out of sight some twenty minutes, when he began 
to think they were gone, and slowly reentering the house, 
fell into a gentle doze. 

The unfortunate gray mare,, who was the agony of 
Joe’s life, floundered along at her own will and pleas- 
ure until the Maypole was no longer visible, and then, 
contracting her legs into what in a puppet would have 
been looked upon as a clumsy and awkward imitation of 
a canter, mended her pace all at once, and did it of her 
own accord. The acquaintance with her rider’s usual 
mode of proceeding, which suggested this improvement 
in hers, impelled her likewise to turn up a by-way, lead- 
ing — not to London, but through lanes running parallel 
with the road they had come, and passing within a few 
hundred yards of the Maypole, which led finally to an 
enclosure surrounding a large, old, red-brick mansion — 
the same of which mention was made as the Warren in 
the first chapter of this history. Coming to a dead stop 


156 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


in a little copse thereabout, she suffered her rider to 
dismount with right go\'d-will, and to tie her to the trunk 
of a tree. • 

“ Stay there, old girl,’* said Joe, “ and let us see 
whether there’s any little commission for me to-day.” 
So saying, he left her to browze upon such stunted 
grass and weeds as happened to grow within the length 
of her tether, and passing through a wicket gate, entered 
the grounds on foot. 

The pathway, after a very few minutes’ walking, 
brought him close to the house, towards which, and 
especially towards one particular window, he directed 
many covert glances. It was a dreary, silent build- 
ing, with echoing court-yards, desolated turret-chambers, 
and whole suites of rooms shut up and mouldering 
to ruin. 

The terrace-garden, dark with the shade of overhang- 
ing trees, had an air of melancholy that was quite op- 
pressive. Great iron gates, disused for many years, and 
red with rust, drooping on their hinges and overgrown 
with long rank grass, seemed as though they tried to 
sink into the ground, and hide their fallen state among 
the friendly weeds. The fantastic monsters on the walls, 
green with age and damp, and covered here and there 
with moss, looked grim and desolate. There was a 
sombre aspect even on that part of the mansion which 
was inhabited and kept in good repair, that struck the 
beholder with a sense of sadness ; of something forlorn 
and failing, whence cheerfulness was banished. It would 
liave been difficult to imagine a bright fire blazing in tlie 
[lull and darkened rooms, or to picture any gayety of 
heart or revelry that the frowning walls shut in. It 
seemed a place where such things had been, but could 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


157 


be no more — the very ghost of a house, haunting the 
old spot in its old outward form, and that was all. 

Much of this decayed and sombre look was attribu- 
table, no doubt, to the death of its former master, and the 
temper of its present occupant; but remembering the 
tale connected with the mansion, it seemed the very 
place for such a deed, and one that might have been 
its predestined theatre years upon years ago. Viewed 
with reference to this legend, the sheet of water where 
the steward’s body had been found appeared to wear a 
black and sullen character, such as no other pool might 
own ; the bell upon the roof that had told the tale of 
murder to the midnight wind, became a very phantom 
whose voice would raise the listener’s hair on end ; and 
every leafless bough that nodded to another, had its 
stealthy whispering of the crime. 

Joe paced up and down the path, sometimes stopping 
in affected contemplation of the building or the prospect, 
sometimes leaning against a tree with an assumed air 
of idleness and indifference, but always keeping an eye 
upon the window he had singled out at first. After some 
quarter of an hour’s- delay, a small white hand was 
waved to him for an instant from this casement, and the 
young man, with a respectful bow, departed ; saying 
under his breath as he crossed his horse again, “ No 
errand for me to-day ! ” 

But the air of smartness, the cock of the hat to which 
John Willet had objected, and the spring nosegay, all 
betokened some little errand of his own, having a more 
interesting object than a vintner or even a locksmith. 
So,, indeed, it turned out ; for when he had settled with 
the vintner — whose place of business was down in some 
deep cellars hard by Tliaines-street, and who was as 


]58 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


purple-faced an old gentleman as if he had all his life 
supported their arched roof on his head — when he had 
settled the account, and taken the receipt, and declined 
tasting more than three glasses of old sherry, to the 
unbounded astonisliment of the purple-faced vintner 
who, gimlet in hand, had projected an attack upon at 
least a score of dusty casks, and who stood transfixed, or 
morally gimleted as it were, to his own wall — when 
he had done all this, and disposed besides of a frugal 
dinner at the Black Lion in Whitechapel ; spurning 
the Monument and John’s advice, he turned his steps 
towards the locksmith’s house, attracted by the eyes of 
blooming Dolly Varden. 

Joe was by no means a sheepish fellow, but, for. all 
that, when he got to the corner of the street in which 
the locksmith lived, he could by no means make up his 
mind to walk straight to the house. First, he resolved 
to stroll up another street for five minutes, then up 
another street for five minutes more, and so on until 
he had lost full half an hour, when he made a bold 
plunge and found himself with a red face and a beating 
lieart in the smoky workshop. 

“Joe Willet, or his ghost?” said Varden, rising from 
the desk at which he was busy with his books, and look- 
ing at him under his spectacles. “ Which is it ? Joe 
in the flesh, eh ? That’s hearty. And how ai*e all the 
Chigwell company, Joe ? ” 

“Much as usual, sir — they and I agree as well as ever.” 

“ Well, well ! ” said the locksmith. “ We must be 
patient, Joe, and bear with old folks’ foibles. How’s 
the mare, Joe ? Does she do the four miles an hour 
us easily as ever ? Ha, ha, ha ! Does she, Joe ? Eh ! 
— What have we there, Joe — a nosegay!” 


BAKNABY BUDGE. 


159 


“ A very poor one, sir — I thought Miss Dolly ” — 
No, no,” said Gabriel, dropping his 7oice, and shak- 
ing his head, “ not Dolly. Give ’em to her mother, 
Joe. A great deal better give ’em to her mother 
Would you mind giving ’em to Mrs. Varden, Joe ? ” 

“ Oh no, sir,” Joe replied, and endeavoring, but not 
with the greatest possible success, to hide his disap- 
pointment. “ I shall be very glad. I’m sure.” 

“ That’s right,” said the locksmith, patting him on the 
back. “ It don’t matter who has ’em, Joe ? ” 

“Not a bit, sir.” — Dear heart, how the words stuck 
in his throat! 

“ Come in,” said Gabriel. “ I have just been called 
to tea. She’s in the parlor.” 

“She,” thought Joe. “Which of ’em I wonder — 
Mrs. or Miss ? ” The locksmith settled the doubt as 
neatly as if it had been expressed aloud, by leading 
him to the door, and saying, “ Martha, my dear, here’s 
young Mr. Willet.” 

Now, Mrs. Varden, regarding the Maypole as a sort 
of human man-trap, or decoy for husbands ; viewing its 
proprietor, and all who aided and abetted him, in thd 
light of so many poacheiis among Christian men ; and 
believing, moreover, that the publicans coupled with 
sinners in Holy Writ were veritable licensed victual- 
lers ; was far from being favorably disposed towards 
her visitor. Wherefore she was taken faint directly ; 
and being duly presented with the crocuses and snow- 
drops, divined on further consideration that they were 
the occasion of the languor which had seized upon her 
spirits. “ I’m afraid I couldn’t bear the room another 
minute,” said the good jady, “if they remained here. 
Would you excuse my putting them out of window?” 


160 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Joe begged she wouldn’t mention it on any account, 
and smiled feebly as he saw them deposited on the sill 
outside. If anybody could have known the pains he 
had taken to make up that despised and misused bunch 
of flowers ! 

“ I feel it quite a relief to get rid of them, I as- 
sure you,” said Mrs. Varden. “ I’m better already.” 
And indeed she did appear to have plucked up her 
spirits. 

Joe expressed his gratitude to Providence for this 
favorable dispensation, and tried to look as if he didn’t 
wonder where Dolly was. 

“ You’re sad people at Chigwell, Mr. Joseph,” said 
Mrs. V. 

“ I hope not, ma’am,” returned Joe. 

“ You’re the cruellest and most inconsiderate people in 
the world,” said Mrs. Varden, bridling. “ I wonder old 
Mr. Willet, having been a married man himself, doesn’t 
know better than to conduct himself as he does. His 
doing it for profit is no excuse. I would rather pay 
the money twenty times over, and have Varden come 
home like a respectable and sober tradesman. If there 
is one cliaracter,” said Mrs. Varden with great empha- 
sis, “that offends and disgusts me more than another, 
it is a sol ” 

“ Come, Martha, my dear,” said the locksmith cheerily, 
“ let us have tea, and don’t let us talk about sots. There 
are none here, and Joe don’t want to hear about them, I 
dare say.” 

At this crisis, Miggs appeared with toast. 

“ I dare say he does not,” said Mrs. Varden ; “ and I 
dare say you do not, Varden. It’s a very unpleasant 
subject I have no doubt, though I won’t say it’s per- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


161 


sonal ” — Miggs coughed — “ whatever I may be forced 
to think.” Miggs sneezed expressively. “ You never 
will know, Varden, and nobody at young Mr. Willefs 
age — you’ll excuse me, sir — can be expected to know, 
what a woman suffers when she is waiting at home un- 
der such circumstances. If you don’t believe me, as I 
know you don’t, here’s Miggs, who is only too often a 
witness of it — ask her.” 

“ Oh ! she were very bad the other night, sir, indeed 
she were,” said Miggs. “If you hadn’t the sweetness 
of an angel in you, mim, I don’t think you could abear 
it, I raly don’t.” 

“ Miggs,” said Mrs. Varden, “ you’re profane.” 

“ Begging your pardon, mim,” returned Miggs, with 
shrill rapidity, “ such was not my intentions, and such 
I hope is not my character, though I am but a ser- 
vant.” 

“ Answering me, Miggs, and providing yourself,” re- 
torted her mistress, looking round with dignity, “ is one 
and the same thing. How dare you speak of angels 
in connection with your sinful fellow-beings — mere ” 
— said Mrs. Varden, glancing at herself in a neighbor- 
ing mirror, and arranging the ribbon of her cap in a 
more becoming fashion — “ mere worms and grovellers 
as we are ! ” 

“ I did not intend, mim, if you please, to give of- 
fence,” said Miggs, confident in the strength of her 
compliment, and developing strongly in the throat a? 
usual, “ and I did not expect it would be took as such. 
I hope I know my own unworthiness, and that I hate 
and despise myself and all my fellow-creatures as every 
nractical Christian should.” 

“ You’ll have the goodness, if you please,” said Mrs. 

VOL. I 11 


J62 


BARXABY RUDGE. 


Varden loftily, “ to step up-stairs and see if Dolly has 
finished dressing, and to tell her that the chair that was 
ordered for her will be here in a minute, and that if she 
keeps it waiting, I shall send it away that instant. — - 
Tm sorry to see that you don^t take your tea, Varden, 
uid that you don’t take yours, Mr. Joseph ; though of 
course it would be foolish of me to expect that anything 
that can be had at home, and in the company of females, 
would please yow.” 

This pronoun was understood in the plural sense, and 
included both gentlemen, upon both of whom it was 
rather hard and undeserved, for Gabriel had applied 
himself to the meal with a very promising appetite, un- 
til it was spoilt by Mrs. Varden herself, and Joe had as 
great a liking for the female society of the locksmith’s 
house — or for a part of it at all events — as man could 
well entertain. 

But he had no opportunity to say anything in his 
own defence, for at that moment Dolly herself appeared, 
and struck him quite dumb with her beauty. Never 
had Dolly looked so handsome as she did then, in ab 
the glow and grace of youth, with all her charms in- 
creased a hundred-fold by a most becoming dress, by 
a thousand little coquettish ways which nobody could 
assume with a better grace, and all the sparkling ex- 
pectation of that accursed party. It is impossible to 
tell how Joe hated that party wherever it was, and 
all the other people who were going to it, whoever 
they were. 

And she hardly looked at him — no, hardly looked 
Rt him. And when the chair was seen through the 
open door coming blundering into the workshop, she 
actually clapped her hands and seemed glad to go. But 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


1G3 


Joe gave her his arm — there was some comfort in that 
, ' — and handed her into it. To see her seat herself in- 
side, with her laughing eyes brighter than diamonds, 
and her hand — surely she had the prettiest hand in 
the world — on the ledge of the open window, and her 
little finger provokingly and pertly tilted up, as if it 
wondered why Joe didn’t squeeze or kiss it ! To think 
how well one or two of the modest snowdrops would 
have become that delicate bodice, and how they were 
lying neglected outside the parlor-window ! To see 
how Miggs looked on, with a face expressive of know- 
ing how all this loveliness was got up, and of being in 
the secret of every string and pin and hook-and-eye, 
and of saying it a’n’t half as real as you think, and 1 
could look quite as well myself if I took the pains ! 
To hear that provoking precious little scream when 
the chair was hoisted on its poles, and to catch that 
transient but not-to-be-forgotten vision of the happy 
face within — what torments and aggravations, and yet 
what delights were these ! The very chairmen seemed 
favored rivals as they bore her down the street. 

There never was such an alteration in a small room in 
a small time as in that parlor when they went back to 
finish tea. So dark, so deserted, so perfectly disen- 
chanted. It seemed such sheer nonsense to be sitting 
tamely there, when she was at a dance with more lovers 
than man could calculate fluttering about her — with the 
whole party doting on and adoring her, and wanting to 
marry her. Miggs was hovering about too ; and the 
fact of her existence, the mere circumstance of her ever 
having been born, appeared, after Dolly, such an unac- 
■’ountable practical joke. It was impossible to talk. It 
pouldn’t be done. He had nothing left for it but to stir 


164 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


his tea round, and round, and round, and ruminate on all 
the fascinations of the locksmith’s lovely daughter. 

Gabriel was dull too. It was a part of the certain un- 
certainty of Mrs. Varden’s temper, that when they were 
in this condition, she should be gay and sprightly. 

“ I need have a cheerful disposition, I am sure,” said 
the smiling housewife, “ to preserve any spirits at all ; 
and how I do it I can scarcely tell.” 

“ Ah, mim,” sighed Miggs, “ begging your pardon for 
the interruption, there a’n’t a many like you.” 

“ Take away, Miggs,” said Mrs. Varden, rising, “ take 
away, pray. I know I’m a restraint here, and as I wish 
everybody to enjoy themselves as they best can, I feel I 
had better go.” 

“ No, no, Martha,” cried the locksmith. “ Stop here. 
I’m sure we shall be very sorry to lose you, eh Joe ! ” 

Joe started and said “ Certainly.” 

“ Thank you, Varden, my dear,” returned his wife ; 
“ but I know your wishes better. Tobacco and beer, or 
spirits, have much greater attractions than any /can boast 
of, and therefore I shall go and sit up-stairs and look out 
of window, my love. Good-night, Mr. Joseph. I’m 
very glad to have seen you, and only wish I could have 
provided something more suitable to your taste. Re- 
member me very kindly if you please to old Mr. Willet, 
and tell him that whenever he comes here I have a crow 
to pluck with him. Good-night ! ” 

Having uttered these words with great sweetness of 
manner the good lady dropped a courtesy remarkable for 
its condescension, and serenely withdrew. 

And it was for this Joe had looked forward to the 
twenty-fifth of March for weeks and weeks, and had 
gathered the flowers with so much care, and had cocked 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


]G5 

his hat, and made himself so smart ! This was the end 
of all his bold determination, resolved upon for the hun-* 
dredth time, to speak out to Dolly and tell her how he 
loved her ! To see her for a minute — for but a minute 
— to find her going out to a party and glad to go ; to be 
looked upon as a common pipe-smoker, beer-bibber, 
spirit-guzzler, and tosspot ! He bade farewell to his 
friend the locksmith, and hastened to take horse at the 
Black Lion, thinking as he turned towards home, as 
many another Joe has thought before and since, that 
here was an end to all his hopes — that the thing was 
impossible and never could be — that she didn’t care for 
him — that he was wretched for life — and that the only 
congenial prospect left him, was to go for a soldier or a 
Bailor, and get some obliging enemy to knock his brains 
out as soon as possible. 


166 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


CHAPTER XIV. 

Joe WiLLET rode leisurely along in his desponding 
mood, picturing the locksmith’s daughter going down 
long country -dances, and poussetting dreadfully with bold 
strangers — which was almost too much to bear — when 
he heard the tramp of a horse’s feet behind him, and 
looking back, saw a well-mounted gentleman advancing 
at a smart canter. As this rider passed, he (diecked his 
steed, and called him of the Maypole by his name. 
Joe set spurs to the gray mare, and was at his side 
directly. 

“ I thought it was you, sir,” he said, touching his hat. 
“ A fair evening, sir. Glad to see you out of doors 
again.” 

The gentleman smiled and nodded. “ What gay doings 
have been going on to-day, Joe ? Is she as pretty as 
ever? Nay, don’t blush, man.” 

“ If I colored at all, Mr. Edward,” said Joe, “ which I 
didn’t know I did, it was to think I should have been 
such a fool as ever to have any hope of her. She’s as 
far out of my reach as — as Heaven is.” 

“ Well, Joe, I hope that’s not altogether beyond it,”, 
said Edward, gooddiumoredly. “ Eh ? ” 

“ Ah ! ” sighed Joe. “ It’s all very fine talking, sir. 
Proverbs are easily made in cold blood. But it can’t be 
helped. Are you bound for our house, sir?” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


167 


“ Yes. As I am not quite strong yet, I shall stay 
there to-night, and ride home coolly in the morning.” 

“ If you’re in no particular hurry,” said Joe, after a 
short silence, “ and will bear with the pace of this poor 
jade, I shall be glad to ride on with you to the Warren, 
sir, and hold your horse when you dismount. It’ll save 
you having to walk from the Maypole, there and back 
again. I can spare the time well, sir, for I am too 
soon.” 

“ And so am I,” returned Edward, “ though I was 
unconsciously riding fast just now, in compliment I sup- 
pose to the pace of my thoughts, which were travelling 
post. We will keep together, Joe, willingly, and be as 
good company as may be. And cheer up, cheer up,^ 
think of the locksmith’s daughter with a stout heart, and 
you shall win her yet.” 

Joe shook his head ; but there was something so 
cheery in the buoyant hopeful manner of this speech, 
that his spirits rose under its influence, and communi- 
cated as it would seem some new impulse even to the 
gray mare, who, breaking from her sober amble into a 
gentle trot, emulated the pace of Edward Chester’s horse, 
and appeared to flatter herself that he was doing his 
very best. 

It was a fine dry night, and the light of a young moon, 
which was then just rising, shed around that peace and 
tmnquillity which gives to evening time its most delicious 
charm. The lengthened shadows of the trees, softened 
us if reflected in still water, threw their carpet on the 
path the travellers pursued, and the light wind stirred 
yet more softly than before, as though it were soothing 
Nature in her sleep. By little and little they ceased 
talking, and rode on side by side in a pleasant silence. 


168 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ The Maypole lights are brilliant to-night,” said Ed- 
ward, as they rode along the lane from which, while the 
intervening trees were bare of leaves, that hostelry was 
visible. 

“ Brilliant indeed, sir,” returned Joe, rising in his stir 
rups to get a better view. “ Lights in the large room 
and a fire glimmering in the best bedchamber ? Why, 
what company can this be for, I wonder ! ” 

“ Some benighted horseman wending towards London, 
and deterred from going on to-night by the marvellous 
tales of my friend the highwayman, I suppose,” said 
Edward. 

“ He must be a horseman of good quality to have such 
accommodations. Your bed too, sir ! ” — 

“ No matter, Joe. Any other room will do for 
me. But come — there’s nine striking. We may push 
on.” 

They cantered forward at as brisk a pace as Joe’s 
charger could attain, and presently stopped in the little 
copse where he had left her in the morning. Edward 
dismounted, gave his bridle to his companion, and walked 
with a light step towards the house. 

A female servant was waiting at a side gate in the 
garden-wall, and admitted him without delay. He hur- 
ried along the terrace-walk, and darted up a flight of 
broad steps leading into an old and gloomy hall, whose 
walls were ornamented with rusty suits of armor, antlers, 
weapons of the chase, and such-like garniture. Here he 
paused, but not long ; for as he looked round, as if ex- 
pecting the attendant to have followed, and wondering 
she had not done so, a lovely girl appeared, whose dark 
hair next moment rested on his breast. Almost at the 
same instant a heavy hand was laid upon her arm, Ed- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


1G9 


ward felt himself thrust away, and Mr. Haredale stood 
between them. 

He regarded the young man sternly without remov 
ing his hat ; with one hand clasped his niece, and with 
the other, in which he held his riding-whip, motioned 
him towards the door. The young man diew himself 
up, and returned his gaze. 

“This is well done of you, sir, to corrupt my ser- 
vants, and enter my house unbidden and in secret, like 
a thief ! ” said Mr. Haredale. “ Leave it, sir, and re- 
turn no more.” 

“ Miss Haredale’s presence,” returned the young man, 
“ and your relationship to her, give you a license which, 
if you are a brave man, you will not abuse. You 
have compelled me to this course, and the fault is 
yours — not mine.” 

“ It is neither generous, nor honorable, nor the act 
of a true man, sir,” retorted the other, “to tamper 
with the affections of a weak, trusting girl, while you 
shrink, in your unworthiness, from her guardian and 
protector, and dare not meet the light of day. More 
than this I will not say to you, save that I forbid you 
this house, and require you to be gone.” 

“ It is neither generous, nor honorable, nor the act 
of a true man to play the spy,” said Edward. “ Your 
words imply dishonor, and I reject them with the 
scorn they merit.” 

“ You will find,” said Mr. Haredale, calmly, “ your 
trusty go-between in waiting at the gate by which you 
entered. I have played no spy’s part, sir. I chanced 
to see you pass the gate, and followed. You might 
have heard me knocking for admission, had you been 
icss swift of foot, or lingered in the garden. Please 


70 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


to withdraw. Your presence here is offensive to nae 
and distressful to my niece.” As he said these words, 
he passed his arm about the waist of the terrified and 
weeping girl, and drew her closer to him ; and though 
the habitual severity of his manner was scarcely changed, 
there was yet apparent in the action an air of kind 
ness and sympathy for her distress. 

“ Mr. Haredale,” said Edward, “ your arm encircles 
her on whom I have set my every hope and thought, 
and to purchase one minute’s happiness for ^yhom I 
would gladly lay down my life; this house is the cas- 
ket that holds the precious jewel of my existence. 
Your niece has plighted her faith to me, and I have 
plighted mine to her. What have I done that 3mu 
should hold me in this light esteem, and give me these 
discourteous words ? ” 

“ You have done that, sir,” answered Mr. Haredale, 
“ which must be undone. You have tied a lover’s- 
knot here which must be cut asunder. Take good 
heed of what I say. Must. I cancel the bond be- 
tween ye* I reject you, and all of your kith and kin 
— all the false, hollow, heartless stock.” 

“ High words, sir,” said Edward, scornfully. 

“Words of purpose and meaning, as you will find,” 
replied the other. “ Lay them to heart.” 

“ Lay you then, these,” said Edward. “ Your cold 
and sullen temper, which chills every breast about you, 
which turns affection into fear, and changes duty into 
dread, has forced us on this secret course, repugnant 
to our nature and our wish, and far more foreign, sir, 
to us than you. I am not a false, a hollow, or a 
heartless man ; the character is yours, who poorly ven- 
ture on these injurious terms, against the truth, and 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


171 


under tlie shelter whereof I reminded you just now 
You shall not cancel the bond between us. I will not 
abandon this pursuit. I rely upon your niece’s truth 
and honor, and set your influence at nought. I leave 
her with a confidence in her pure faith, which you 
will never weaken, and with no concern but that I do 
not leave her in some gentler care.” 

With that, he pressed her cold hand to his lips, and 
once more encountering and returning Mr. Haredale’s 
steady look, withdrew. 

A few words to Joe as he mounted his horse suffi- 
ciently explained what had passed, and renewed all 
that young gentleman’s despondency with tenfold ag- 
gravation. They rode back to the Maypole without 
exchanging a syllable, and arrived at the door with 
heavy hearts. 

Old John, who had peeped from behind the red 
curtain as they rode up shouting for Hugh, was out 
directly, and said with great importance as he held 
the young man’s stirrup, — 

“ He’s comfortable in bed — the best bed. A thor- 
ough gentleman ; the smilingest, affablest gentleman I 
ever had to do with.” 

“Who, Willet?” said Edward carelessly, as he dis- 
mounted. 

“Your worthy father, sir,” replied John. “Your 
honorable, venerable father.” 

“ What does he mean ? ” said Edward, looking with 
a mixture of alarm and doubt at Joe. 

“ What do you mean ? ’ said Joe. “ Don’t you see 
Mr. Edward doesn’t understand, father ? ” 

“Why, didn’t you know of it, sir?” said John, 
opening his eyes wide. “ How very singular ! Bless 


172 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


you, he’s been here ever since noon to-day, and Mr. 
Haredale has been having a long talk with him, and 
hasn’t been gone an hour.” 

“ My father, Willet ! ” 

“Yes, sir, he told me so — a handsome, slim, up- 
right gentleman, in green-and-gold. In your old room 
up yonder, sir. No doubt you can go in, sir,” said 
John, walking backwards into the road and looking up 
at the window. “ He hasn’t put out his candles yet, 
I see.” 

Edward glanced at the window also, and hastily 
murmuring that he had changed his mind — forgotten 
something — and must return to London, mounted his 
horse again and rode away ; leaving the Willets, father 
and son, looking at each other in mute astonishment. 


BARNABY RLDGE. 


173 


CHAPTER XV. 

i 

At hood next day, John Willet’s guest sat lingering 
over his breakfast in his own home, surrounded by a 
variety of comforts, which left the Maypole’s highest 
flight and utmost stretch of accommodation at an in- 
finite distance behind, and suggested comparisons very 
much to the disadvantage and disfavor of that vener- 
able tavern. 

In the broad old-fashioned window-seat — as capa- 
cious as many modern sofas, and cushioned to serve the 
purpose of a luxurious settee — in the broad old-fash- 
ioned window-seat of a roomy chamber, Mr. Chester 
lounged, very much at his ease, over a well-furnished 
breakfast-table. He had exchanged his riding-coat for 
a handsome morning-gown, his boots for slippers ; had 
been at great pains to atone for the having been 
obliged to make his toilet when he rose without the 
aid of dressing-case and tiring equipage; and, having 
gradually forgotten through these means the discomforts 
of an indifferent night and an early ride, was in a 
state of perfect complacency, indolence, and satisfac 
tion. 

The situation in which he found himself, indeed, was 
particularly favorable to the growth of these feelings ; 
for, not to mention the lazy influence of a late and 
lonely breakfast, with the additional sedative of a news- 
paper, there was an air of repose about his place of 


174 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


residence peculiar to itself, and which hangs about it, 
even in these times, when, it is more bustling and busy 
than it was in days of yore. 

There are, still, worse places than the Temple, on 
a sultry day, for basking in the sun, or resting idly 
in the shade. There is yet a drowsiness in its courts, 
and a dreamy dulness in its trees and gardens; those 
who pace its lanes and squares may yet hear the 
echoes of their footsteps on the sounding stones, and 
read upon its gates, in passing from the tumult of the 
Strand or Fleet Street, “ Who enters here leaves noise 
behind.” There is still the plash of falling water in 
fair Fountain Court, and there are yet nooks and cor- 
ners where dun-haunted students may look down from 
their dusty garrets, on a vagrant ray of sunlight patch- 
ing the shade of the tall houses, and seldom troubled 
to reflect a passing stranger’s form. There is yet, in 
the Temple, something * of a clerkly monkish atmos- 
phere, which public offices of law have not disturbed, 
and even legal firms have failed to scare away. In 
summer time, its pumps suggest to thirsty idlers, springs 
cooler, and more sparkling, and deeper than other wells ; 
and as they trace the spellings of full pitchers on the 
heated ground, they snuff the freshness, and, sighing, 
cast sad looks towards the Thames, and think of baths 
and boats, and saunter on, despondent. 

It was in a room in Paper Buildings — a row of 
goodly tenements, shaded in front by ancient trees, and 
looking, at the back, upon the Temple Gardens — that 
this, our idler, lounged ; now taking up again the paper 
he had laid down a hundred times ; now trifling with the 
fragments of his meal ; now pulling forth his golden 
toothpick, and glancing leisurely about the room, or out 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


175 


at window into the trim garden walks, where a few early 
loiterers were already pacing to and fro. Here a pair 
of lovers met to quarrel and make up ; there a dark-eyed 
nursery-maid had better eyes for Templars than her 
charge ; on this hand an ancient spinster, with her lap- 
dog in a string, regarded both enormities with scornful 
sidelong looks ; on that a weazen old gentleman, ogling 
the nursery-maid, looked with like scorn upon the spin- 
ster, and wondered she didn’t know she was no longer 
young. Apart from all these, on the river’s margin two 
or three couple of business-talkers walked slowly up and 
down in earnest conversation ; and one young man sat 
thoughtfully on a bench, alone. 

“ Ned is amazingly patient ! ” said Mr. Chester, glanc- 
ing at this last-named person as he set down his teacup 
and plied the golden toothpick, “ immensely patient ! 
He was sitting yonder when I began to dress, and has 
scarcely changed his posture since. A most eccentric 
dog ! ” 

As he spoke, the figure rose, and came towards him 
with a rapid pace. 

“ Really, as if he had heard me,” said the father, re- 
suming his newspaper with a yawn. “ Dear Ned ! ” 

Presently the room-door opened, and the young man 
entered ; to whom his father gently waved his hand and 
smiled. 

“ Are you at leisure for a little conversation, sir ? ” 
laid Edward. 

“ Surely, Ned. I am always at leisure. You know 
my constitution. — Have you breakfasted ? ” 

“ Three hours ago.” ’( 

“ What a very early dog ! ” cried his father, contem- 
plating him from behind the toothpick, with a languid 
smile. 


176 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“The truth is,” said Edward, bringing a chair for- 
ward, and seating himself near the table, “ that I slept 
but ill last night, and was glad to rise. The cause of 
my uneasiness cannot but be known to you, sir ; and it 
is upon that, I wish to speak.” 

“ My dear boy,” returned his father, “ confide in me, 
I beg. But you know my constitution — don’t be prosy, 
Ned.” 

“ I will be plain, and brief,” said Edward. 

“ Don’t say you will, my good fellow,” returned his 
father, crossing his legs, “ or you certainly will not. You 
are going to tell me ” 

“ Plainly this, then,” said the son, with an air of great 
concern, “ that I know where you were last night — 
from being on the spot, indeed — and whom you saw, 
and what your purpose was.” 

“ You don’t say so ! ” cried his father. “ I am de- 
lighted to hear it. It saves us the worry, and terrible 
wear and tear of a long explanation, and is a great 
relief for both. At the very house ! Why didn’t 
you come up ? I should have been charmed to see 
you.” 

“ I knew that what I had to say would be better said 
after a night’s reflection, when both of us were cool,” 
returned the son. 

“’Fore Gad, Ned,” rejoined the father, “I was cool 
enough last night. That detestable Maypole ! By some 
infernal contrivance of the builder, it holds the wind and 
keeps it fresh. You remember the sharp east wind that 
blew so hard five weeks ago ? I give you my honor it was 
rampant in that old house last night, though out of doors 
there was a dead calm. But you were saying ” 

“ I was about to say. Heaven knows how seriously 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


177 


and earnestly, that you have made me wretched, sir. 
Will you hear me gravely for a moment ? ” 

“ My dear Ned,” said his father, I will hear you 
with the patience of an anchorite. Oblige me with the 
milk.” 

“ I saw Miss Haredale last night,” Edward resumed, 
when he had complied with this request ; “ her uncle, in 
lier presence, immediately after your interview, and, as 
of course I know, in consequence of it, forbade me the 
house, and, with circumstances of indignity which are of 
your creation I am sure, commanded me to leave it on 
the instant.” 

“ For his manner of doing so, I give you my honor, 
Ned, I am not accountable,” said his father. “ That you 
must excuse. He is a mere boor, a log, a brute, with no 
address in life. — Positively a fly in the jug. The first 
I have seen this year.” 

Edward rose, and paced the room. His imperturbable 
parent sipped his tea. 

“Father,” said the young man, stopping at length be- 
fore him, “ we must not trifle in this matter. We must 
not deceive each other, or ourselves. Let me pursue the 
manly open part, I wish to take, and do not repel me by 
this unkind indifference.” 

“ Whether I am indifferent or no,” returned the other, 
“ I leave you, my dear boy, to judge. A ride of twenty- 
five or thirty miles, through miry roads — a Maypole 
linner — a tete-a-tete with Haredale, which, vanity 
apart, was quite a Valentine and Orson business — a 
Maypole bed — a Maypole landlord, and a Maypole ret- 
inue of idiots and centaurs ; — whether the voluntary 
endurance of these things looks like indifference, dear 
Ned, or like the excessive anxiety, and devotion, and all 
VOL. I. 12 / 


178 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


that of thing, of a parent, you shall determine for 
yourself.” 

“ I wish you to consider, sir,” said Edward, “ in what 
a cruel situation I am placed. Loving Miss Haredale 
as I do ” 

“ My dear fellow,” interrupted his father with a com- 
passionate smile, “you do nothing of the kind. You 
don^t know anything about it. There’s no such thing, I 
assure you. Now, do take my word for it. You have 
good sense, Ned, — great good sense. I wonder you 
should be guilty of such amazing absurdities. You really 
surprise me.” 

“ I repeat,” said his son firmly, “ that I love her. You 
have interposed to part us, and have, to the extent I 
have just now told you of, succeeded. May I induce 
you, sir, in time, to think more favorably of our attach- 
ment, or is it your intention and your fixed design to 
hold us asunder if you can ? ” 

“ My dear Ned,” returned his father, taking a pinch 
of snuff and pushing his box towards him, “ that is my 
purpose most undoubtedly.” 

“ The time that has elapsed,” rejoined his son, “ since 
I began to know her worth, has flown in such a dream 
that until now I have hardly once paused to reflect upon 
my true position. What is it ? From ray childhood I 
have been accustomed to luxury and idleness, and have 
been bred as though my fortune were large, and my ex- 
pectations almost without a limit. The idea of wealth 
has been familiarized to me from my cradle. I have 
been taught to look upon those means, by which men 
raise themselves to riches and distinction, as being be- 
yond my heeding, and beneath my care. I have been, 
as the phrase is, liberally educated, and am fit for noth- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


179 


ing. I find myself at last wholly dependent upon you, 
with no resource but in your favor. In this momentous 
question of my life we do not, and it would seem, we 
never can, agree. I have shrunk instinctively alike from 
those to whom you have urged me to pay court, and 
from the motives of interest and gain which have ren- 
dered them in your eyes visible objects for my suit. If 
there never has been thus much plain-speaking between 
us before, sir, the fault has not been mine, indeed. If I 
seem to speak too plainly now, it is, believe me father, 
in the hope that there may be a franker spirit, a worthier 
reliance, and a kinder confidence between us in time to 
come.” 

“ My good fellow,” said his smiling father, “ you quite 
affect me. Go on, my dear Edward, I beg. But re- 
member your promise. There is great earnestness, vast 
candor, a manifest sincerity in all you say, but I fear I 
observe the faintest indications of a tendency to prose.” 

“ I am very sorry, sir.” 

“ I am very sorry too, Ned, but you know that I can- 
not fix my mind for any long period upon one subject. 
If you’ll come to the point at once. I’ll imagine all that 
ought to go before, and conclude it said. Oblige me 
with the milk again. Listening invariably makes me 
feverish.” 

“ What I would say then, tends to this,” said Edward. 
“ I cannot bear this absolute dependence, sir, even upon 
you. Time has been lost and opportunity thrown away, 
but I am yet a young man, and may retrieve it. Will you 
give me the means of devoting such abilities and energies 
as I possess, to some worthy pursuit ? Will you let me 
»ry to make for myself an honorable path in life ? For 
any term you please to name — say for five years if you 


180 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


will — I will pledge myself to move no further in the 
matter of our difference without your full concurrence. 
During that period, I will endeavor earnestly and pa- 
tiently, if ever man did, to open some prospect for myself, 
and free you from the burden you fear I should become 
if I married one whose worth and beauty are her chief 
endowments. Will you do this, sir ? At the expiration 
of the term we agree upon, let us discuss this subject 
again. Till then, unless it is revived by you, let it never 
be renewed between us.” 

“ My dear Ned,” returned his father, laying down the 
newspaper at which he had been glancing carelessly 
and throwing himself back in the window-seat, “ I be- 
lieve you know how very much I dislike what are called 
family affairs, which are only fit for plebeian Christ- 
mas days, and have no manner of business with people 
of our condition. But as you are proceeding upon a 
mistake, Ned — altogether upon a mistake — I will con- 
quer my repugnance to entering on such matters, and 
give you a perfectly plain and candid answer, if you will 
do me the favor to shut the door.” 

Edward having obeyed him, he took an elegant 
little knife from his pocket, and paring his nails, con- 
tinued : — 

“ You have to thank me, Ned, for being of good 
family ; for your mother, charming person as she 
was, and almost broken-hearted, and so forth, as she 
left me, when she was prematurely compelled to be- 
eome immortal — had nothing to boast of in that re- 
spect.” 

“ Her father was at least an eminent lawyer, sir,” 
jaid Edward. 

“ Quite right, Ned ; perfectly so. He stood high at 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


181 


the bar, had a great name and great wealth, but hav- 
ing risen from nothing — I have always closed my eyes 
to the circumstance and steadily resisted its contempla- 
tion, but I fear his father dealt in pork, and that his 
business did once involve cowheel and sausages — he 
wished to marry his daughter into a good family. He 
had his heart’s desire, Ned. I was a younger son’s 
younger son, and I married her. We each had our 
object, and gained it. She stepped at once into the 
politest and best circles, and I stepped into a fortune 
which I assure you was very necessary to my comfort — 
quite indispensable. Now, my good fellow, that fortune 
is among the things that have been. It is gone, Ned, 
and has been gone — how old are you ? I always 
forget.” 

“ Seven-and-twenty, sir.” 

‘‘ Are you indeed ? ” cried his father, raising his eye- 
lids in a languishing surprise. “ So much ! Then I 
should say, Ned, that as nearly as I remember, its skirts 
vanished from human knowledge, about eighteen or 
nineteen years ago. It was about that time when I 
came to live in these chambers (once your grandfather’s, 
and bequeathed by that extremely respectable person to 
me), and commenced to live upon an inconsiderable an- 
nuity and my past reputation.” 

“ You are jesting with me, sir,” said Edward. 

“ Not in the slightest degree, I assure you,” returned 
his father with great composure. “ These family topics 
are so extremely dry, that I am sorry to say they don’t 
admit of any such relief. It is for that reason, and 
because they have an appearance of business, that I 
dislike them so very much. Well ! You know the rest. 
A son, Ned, unless he is old enough to be a companion 


182 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


— that IS to say, unless he is some two or three and 
twenty — is not the kind of thing to have about one. 
He is a restraint upon his father, his father is a restraint 
upon him, and they make each other mutually uncom- 
fortable. Therefore, until within the last four years or 
so — I have a poor memory for dates, and if I mistake, 
you will correct me in your own mind — you pursued 
your studies at a distance, and picked up a great variety 
of accomplishments. Occasionally we passed a week or 
two together here, and disconcerted each other as only 
such near relations can. At last you came home. I 
candidly tell you, my 'dear boy, that if you had been 
awkward and overgrown, I should have exported you to 
some distant part of the world.” 

“ I wish with all my soul you had, sir,” said Ed- 
ward. 

“ No, you don’t, Ned,” rejoined his father coolly ; 
“ you are mistaken, I assure you. I found you a hand- 
some, prepossessing, elegant fellow, and I threw you into 
the society I can still command. Having done that, my 
dear fellow, I consider that I have provided for you in 
life, and rely on your doing something to provide for me 
in return.” 

“ I do not understand your meaning, sir.” 

“ My meaning, Ned, is obvious — I observe another 
fly in the cream-jug, but have the goodness not to take 
t out as you did the first, for their walk when their legs 
are milky, is extremely ungraceful and disagreeable 

— my meaning is, that you must do as I did ; that 
you must marry well and make the most of your- 
self.” 

“ A mere fortune-hunter ! ” cried the son, indig- 
nantly. 


BARN A BY RUDGE. 


183 


“ What in the devil’s name, Ned, would you be ! ” 
returned the father. “ All men are fortune-hunters, are 
they not? The law, the church, the court, the camp — 
see how they are all crowded with fortune-hunters, jos- 
tling each other in the pursuit. The Stock-exchange, 
the pulpit, the counting-liouse, the royal drawing-room, 
the Senate, — what but fortune-hunters are they filled 
with ? A fortune-hunter ! Yes. You are one ; and you 
would be nothing else, my dear Ned, if you were the 
greatest courtier, lawyer, legislator, prelate, or mer- 
chant, in existence. If you are squeamish and moral, 
Ned, console yourself with the feflection that at the 
worst your fortune-hunting can make but one person 
miserable or unhappy. How many people do you sup- 
pose these other kinds of huntsmen crush in following 
their sport — hundreds at a step ? Or thousands ? ” 

The young man leant his head upon his hand, and 
made no answer. 

“I am quite charmed,” said the father rising, and 
walking slowly to and fro — stopping now and then to 
glance at himself in a mirror, or survey a picture 
through his glass, with the air of a connoisseur, “ that 
we have had this conversation, Ned, unpromising as it 
was. It establishes a confidence between us which is 
quite delightful, and was certainly necessary, though 
how you can ever have mistaken oiy position and de- 
signs, I confess I cannot understand. I conceived, unti 
I found your fancy for this girl, that all these points » 
were tacitly agreed upon between us.” 

“ I know you were embarrassed, sir,” returned the 
«on, raising his head for a moment, and then falling 
into his former attitude, “but I had no idea we were 
the beggared wretches you describe, flow could I sup- 


184 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


pose it, bred as I have been; witnessing the life you 
have always led ; and the appearance you have always 
made ? ” 

“ My dear child,” said the father — “ for you really 
talk so like a child that I must call you one — you 
were bred upon a careful principle; the very manner 
of your education, I assure you, maintained my credit 
surprisingly. As to the life I lead, I must lead it, Ned 
1 must have these little refinements about me. I have 
always been used to them, and I cannot exist without 
them. They must surround me, you observe, and there- 
fore they are here. "With regard to our circumstances, 
Ned, you may set your mind at rest upon that score. 
They are desperate. Your own appearance is by no 
means despicable, and our joint pocket-money alone 
devours our income. That’s the truth.” 

Why have I never known this before ? Why have 
you encouraged me, sir, to an expenditure and mode of 
life to which we have no right or title ? ” 

« My good fellow,” returned his father more compas- 
sionately than ever, “ if you made no appearance how 
could you possibly succeed in the pursuit for which I 
destined you ? As to our mode of life, every man has 
a right to live in the best way he can ; and to make 
himself as comfortable as he can, or he is an unnatural 
scoundpel. Our debts, I grant, are very great, and 
therefore it the more behooves you, as a young man 
• of principle and honor, to pay them off as speedily as 
possible.” 

“ The villain’s part,” muttered Edwai-d, “ that I 
have unconsciously played ! I to win the heart of 
Emma Haredale ! I would, for her sake, I had died 
first ! ” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


185 


“ I am glad you see, Ned,” returned his father, “ how 
perfectly self-evident it is, that nothing can be done in 
that quarter. But apart from this, and the necessity 
of your speedily bestowing yourself in another (as you 
know you could to-morrow, if you chose), I wish you’d 
look upon it pleasantly. In a religious point of view 
alone, how could you ever think of uniting yourself to 
a Catholic, unless she was amazingly rich ? You who 
ought to be so very Protestant, coming of such a Prot- 
estant family as you do. Let us be moral, Ned, or 
we are nothing. Even if one could set that objection 
aside, which is impossible, we come to another which is 
quite conclusive. The very idea of marrying a girl 
whose father was killed, like meat ! Good God, Ned, 
how disagreeable ! Consider the impossibility of hav- 
ing any respect for your father-in-law under such 
unpleasant circumstances — think of his having been 
‘ viewed ’ by jurors, and ‘ sat upon ’ by coroners, and of 
his very doubtful position in the family ever afterwards. 
It seems to me such an indelicate sort of thing that I 
really think the girl ought to have been put to death 
by the state to prevent its happening. But I tease 
you perhaps. You would rather be alone ? My dear 
Ned, most willingly. God bless you. I shall be going 
out presently, but we shall meet to-night, or if not to- 
night, certainly to-morrow. Take care of yourself in the 
mean time for both our sakes. You are a person of 
great consequence to me, Ned — of vast consequenc' 
indeed. God bless you ! ” 

With these words, the father, who had been arranging 
liis cravat in the glass, while he uttered them in a dis- 
connected careless manner, withdrew, humming a tune 
%s he went. The son, who had appeared so lost in 


186 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


thought as not to hear or understand them, remained 
quite still and silent. After the lapse of half an hour 
or so, the elder Chester, gayly dressed, went out. The 
younger still sat with his head resting on his hands, 
in what appeared to be a kind of stupor. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


187 


CHAPTER XVL ‘ 

A SERIES of pictures representing the streets of 
London in the night, even at the comparatively recent 
date of this tale, would present to the eye something 
so very different in character from the reality which 
is witnessed in these times, that it would be difficult 
for the beholder to recognize his most familiar walks 
in the altered aspect of little more than half a century 
ago. 

They were, one and all, from the broadest and best to 
the narrowest and least frequented, very dark. The oil 
and cotton lamps, though regularly trimmed twice or 
thrice in the long winter nights, burnt feebly at the best; 
and at a late hour, when they were unassisted by the 
lamps and candles in the shops, cast but a narrow track 
of doubtful light upon the footway, leaving the project- 
ing doors and house-fronts in the deepest gloom. Many 
of the courts and lanes were left in total darkness ; those 
of the meaner sort, where one glimmering light twinkled 
for a score of houses, being favored in no slight degree^ 
Even in these places, the inhabitants had often good 
reason for extinguishing their lamp as soon as it was 
lighted ; and the watch being utterly inefficient and 
powerless to prevent them, they did so at their pleasure. 
Thus, in the lightest thoroughfares, there was at every 
turn some obscure and dangerous spot whither a thief 
might fly for shelter, and few would care to follow ; and 


188 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


the city being belted round by fields, green lanes, waste 
grounds, and lonely roads, dividing it at that time from 
the suburbs that have joined it since, escape, even where 
the pursuit was hot, was rendered easy. 

It is no wonder that with these favoring circumstances 
in full and constant operation, street robberies, often ac- 
companied by cruel wounds, and not unfrequently by 
loss of life, should have been of nightly occurrence in 
the very heart of London, or that quiet folks should 
liave had great dread of traversing its streets after 
the shops were closed. It was not unusual for those 
who wended home alone at midnight, to keep the mid- 
dle of the road, the better to guard against surprise from 
lurking footpads ; few would venture to repair at a late 
hour to Kentish Town or Hampstead, or even to Ken- 
sington or Chelsea, unarmed and unattended ; while he 
who had been loudest and most valiant at the supper- 
table or the tavern, and had but a mile or so to go, was 
glad to fee a link-boy to escort him home. 

There were many other characteristics — not quite so 
disagreeable — about the thoroughfares of London then, 
with which they had been long familiar. Some of the 
shops, especially those to the eastward of Temple Bar, 
still adhered to the old practice of hanging out a sign ; 
and the creaking and swinging of these boards in their 
iron frames on windy nights, formed a strange and 
mournful concert for the ears of those who lay awake 
in bed or hurried through the streets. Long stands of 
liackney-chairs and groups of chairmen, compared with 
whom the coachmen of our day are gentle and polite, 
obstru(;ted the way and filled the air with clamor ; niglit- 
cellars, indicated by a little stream of light crossing the 
pavement, and stretching out half-way into the road, and 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


189 


by the stifled roar of voices from below, yawned for the 
reception and entertainment of the most abandoned of 
both sexes ; under every shed and bulk small groups 
of link-boys gamed away the earnings of the day ; or 
one more weary than the rest, gave way to sleep, and 
let the fragment of his torch fall hissing on the puddled 
gi’ound. 

Then there was the watch with staff and lantern 
crying the hour, and the kind of weather ; and those 
who woke up at his voice and turned them round in 
bed, were glad to hear it rained, or snowed, or blew, or 
froze, for very comfort’s sake. The solitary passenger 
was startled by the chairmen’s cry of “ By your leave 
there ! ” as two came trotting past him with their empty 
vehicle — carried backwards to show its being disen- 
gaged — and hurried to the nearest stand. Many a 
private chair too, enclosing some fine lady, monstrously 
hooped and furbelowed, and preceded by running-foot- 
men bearing flambeaux — for which extinguishers are 
yet suspended before the doors of a few houses of the 
better sort — made the way gay and light as it danced 
along, and darker and more dismal when it had passed. 
It was not unusual for these running gentry, who car- 
ried it with a very high hand, to quarrel in the servants* 
hall while waiting for their masters and mistresses ; and, 
falling to blows either there or in the street without, to 
strew the place of skirmish with hair-powder, fragments 
of bag-wigs, and scattered nosegays. Gaming, the vice 
which ran so high among all classes (the fasliion being 
of course set by the upper), was generally the cause of 
these disputes ; for cards and dice were as openly used, 
ftnd worked as much mischief, and yielded as much ex- 
citement below stairs, as above. While incidents like 


190 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


these, arising out of drums and masquerades and parties 
at quadrille, were passing at the west end of the town, 
heavy stage-coaches and scarce heavier wagons were 
lumbering slowly towards the city, the coachmen, guard, 
and passengers armed to the teeth, and the coach — a 
day or so, perhaps, behind its time, but that was nothing 
— despoiled by highwaymen ; who made no scruple to 
attack, alone and single-handed, a whole caravan of 
goods and men, and sometimes shot a passenger or two, 
and were sometimes shot themselves, just as the case 
might be. On the morrow, rumors of this new act of 
daring on the road yielded matter for a few hours’ con- 
versation through the town, and a Public Progress of 
some fine gentleman (half drunk) to Tyburn, dressed 
in the newest fashion and damning the ordinary with 
unspeakable gallantry and grace, furnished to the pop- 
ulace, at once a pleasant excitement and a wholesome 
and profound example. 

Among all the dangerous characters, who, in such a 
state of society, prowled and skulked in the metropolis at 
night, there was one man, from whom many as uncouth 
and fierce as he, shrunk with an involuntary dread. 
Who he was, or whence he came, was a question often 
asked, but which none could answer. His name was 
unknown, he had never been seen until within eight 
days or thereabouts, and was equally a stranger to the 
old ruffians, upon whose haunts he ventured fearlessly 
as to the young. He could be no spy, for he never 
removed his slouched hat to look about him, entered 
into conversation with no man, heeded nothing that 
passed, listened to no discourse, regarded nobody that 
came or went. But so surely as the dead of night set 
in, so suiely this man was in the midst of the loose 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


191 


concourse in the night-cellar where outcasts of eyery 
grade resorted ; and tJiere he sat till morning. 

He was not only a spectre at their licentious feasts; 
a something in the midst of their revelry and riot that 
chilled and haunted them ; but out of doors he was the 
same. Directly it was dark, he was abroad — never in 
company with any one, but always alone ; never linger- 
ing or loitering, but always walking swiftly ; and looking 
(so they said who had seen him) over his shoulder from 
time to time, and as he did so quickening his pace. In 
the fields, the lanes, the roads, in all quarters of the 
town — east, west, north, and south — that man was 
seen gliding on, like a shadow. He was always hurry- 
ing away. Those who encountered him, saw him steal 
past, caught sight of the backward glance, and so lost 
him in the darkness. 

This constant restlessness and flitting to and fro, gave 
rise to strange stories. He was seen in such distant and* 
remote places, at times so nearly tallying with each other, 
that some doubted whether there were not two of them, 
or more — some, whether he had not unearthly means 
of travelling from spot to spot. The footpad hiding in 
a ditch had marked him passing like a ghost along its 
brink ; the vagrant had met him on the dark high-road ; 
the beggar had seen him pause upon the bridge to look 
down at the water, and then sweep on again ; they who 
dealt in bodies with the surgeons could swear he slept 
in church-yards, and that they had beheld him glide 
away among the tombs, on their approach. And as 
they told these stories to each other, one who had looked 
about him would pull his neighbor by the sleeve, and 
there he would be among them. 

At last, one man — he was of those whose commerce 


192 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


lay among the graves — resolved to question this strange 
companion. Next night, when he had eat his poor meal 
voraciously (he was accustomed to do that, they had ob- 
served, as though he had no other in the day), this fellow 
sat down at his elbow. 

“ A black night, master ! ” 

“ It is a black night.” 

“ Blacker than last, though that was pitchy too. Didn’t 
I pass you near the turnpike in the Oxford-road ? ” 

“ It’s like you may. I don’t know.” 

“ Come, come, master,” cried the fellow, urged on by 
the looks of his comrades, and slapping him on the 
shoulder ; “ be more companionable and communicative. 
Be more the gentleman in this good company. There 
are tales among us that you have sold yourself to the 
devil, and I know not what.” 

“We all have, have we not?” returned the stranger, 
looking up. “ If we were fewer in number, perhaps he 
would give better wages.” 

“ It goes rather hard with you, indeed,” said the fel- 
low, as the stranger disclosed his haggard unwashed 
face, and torn clothes. “ What of that ? Be merry, 
master. A stave of a roaring song now ” — 

“ Sing you, if you desire to hear one,” replied the 
other, shaking him roughly off ; “ and don’t touch me 
if you’re a prudent man ; I carry arms which go off 
easily — they have done so, before now — and make it 
dangerous for strangers who don’t know the trick of 
them, to lay hands upon me.” 

“ Do you threaten ? ” said the fellow. 

“Yes,” returned the other, rising and turning upon 
him, and looking fiercely round as if in apprehension 
of a general attack. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


198 


His voice, and look, and bearing — all expressive 
of the wildest recklessness and desperation — daunted 
while they repelled the by-standers. Although in a 
very different sphere of action now, they were not 
without much of the effect they had wrought at the 
Maypole Inn. 

I am what you all are, and live as you all do,” said 
the man sternly, after a short silence. “ I am in hiding 
here like the rest, and if we were surprised, would per- 
haps do ray part with the best of ye. If it’s my humor 
to be left to myself, let me have it. Otherwise,” — and 
here he swore a tremendous oath — “there’ll be mischief 
done in this place, though there are odds of a score 
against me.” 

A low murmur, having its origin perhaps in a dread 
of the man and the mystery that surrounded him, or 
perhaps in a sincere opinion on the part of some of 
those present, that it would be an inconvenient prece- 
dent to meddle too curiously with a gentleman’s pri- 
vate affairs if he saw reason to conceal them, warned 
the fellow who had occasioned this discussion that he 
had best pursue it no further. After a short time the 
strange man lay down upon a bench to sleep, and 
when they thought of him again, they found that he 
was gone. 

Next night, as soon as it was dark, he was abroad 
again and traversing the streets ; he was before the 
locksmith’s house more than once, but the family were 
out, and it was close shut. This night he crossed 
London Bridge and passed into Southwark. As he 
glided down a by-street, a woman with a little basket 
on her arm, turned into it at the other end. Directly 
he observed her, he sought the shelter of an archway, 

von. I. 13 


194 


BARNABY KUDGE. 


and stood aside until she had passed. Then lie emerged 
cautiously from his hiding-place, and followed. 

She went into several shops to purchase various 
kinds of household necessaries, and round every place 
at which she stopped he hovered like her evil spirit; 
following her when she reappeared. It was nigh eleven 
o’clock, and the passengers in the streets were thinning 
fast, when she turned, doubtless to go home. The phan- 
tom still followed her. 

She turned into the same by-street in which be had 
seen her first, which, being free from shops, and narrow, 
was extremely dark. She quickened her pace here, as 
though distrustful of being stopped, and robbed of such 
trifling property as she carried with her. He crept 
along on the other side of the road. Had she been 
gifted with the speed of wind, it seemed as if his ter- 
rible shadow would have tracked her down. 

At length the widow — for she it was — reached her 
own door, and, panting for breath, paused to take the 
key from her basket. In a flush and glow, with the 
haste she had made, and the pleasure of being safe at 
home, she stooped to draw it out, when, raising her 
head, she saw him standing silently beside her ; the 
apparition of a dream. 

His hand .was on her mouth, but that was needless, 
for her tongue clove to its roof, and her power of 
utterance was gone. “ I have been looking for you 
many nights. Is the house empty ? Answer me. Is 
any one inside ? ” 

She could only answer by a rattle in her throat, 

“ Make me a sign.” 

She seemed to indicate that there was no one there. 
He took the key, unlocked the door, carried her in, 
and secured it carefully behind them. 


RARNABY RUDGE. 


195 


CHAPTER XVIL 

It was a chilly night, and the fire in the widow’s 
|)arlor had burnt low. Her strange companion placed 
her in a chair, and stooping down before the half-ex- 
tinguished ashes, raked them together and fanned them 
with his hat. From time to time he glanced at her 
over his shoulder, as though to assure himself of her 
remaining quiet and making no effort to depart ; and 
that done, busied himself about the fire again. 

It was not without reason that he took these pains, 
for his dress was dank and drenched with wet, his jaws 
rattled with cold, and he shivered from head to foot. 
It had rained hard during the previous night and for 
some hours in the morning, but since noon it had been 
fine. Wheresoever he had passed the hours of dark- 
ness, his condition sufficiently betokened that many of 
them had been spent beneath the open sky. Besmeared 
with mire ; his saturated clothes clinging with a damp 
embrace about his limbs ; his beard unshaven, his face 
unwashed, his meagre cheeks worn into deep hollows, 
— - a more miserable wretch could hardly be, than this 
man who now cowered down upon the widow’s hearth, 
and watched the struggling flame with bloodshot eyes. 

She had covered her face with her hands, fearing, as 
it seemed, to look towards him. So they remained for 
tfome short time in silence. Glancing round again, he 
asked at length ; — 


196 


BARNABY RUDGE, 


‘‘ Is this your house ? ” 

“ It is. Why, in the name of Heaven, do you darken 
it? ” 

“ Give me meat and drink,” he answered sullenly, 
“ or I dare do more than that. The very marrow in 
my bones is cold, with wet and hunger. I must have 
warmth and food, and I will have them here.” 

“You were the robber on the Chigwell road.” 

“ I was.” 

“ And nearly a murderer then.” 

“ The will was not wanting. There was one came 
upon me and raised the hue-and-cry, that it would have 
gone hard with, but for his nimbleness. I made a thrust 
at him.” 

“ You thrust your sword at him ! ” cried the widow, 
looking upwards. “ You hear this man ! you hear and 
saw!” 

He looked at her, as, with her head thrown back, and 
her hands tight clinched together, she uttered these 
words in an agony of appeal. Then, starting to his feet 
as she had done, he advanced towards her. 

“ Beware 1 ” she cried in a suppressed voice, whose 
firmness stopped him midway. “ Do not so much as 
touch me with a ‘finger, or you are lost; body and 
soul, you are lost.” 

“ Hear me,” he replied, menacing her with his hand. 
“ I, that in the form of a man live the life of a hunted 
beast I that in the body am a spirit, a ghost upon the 
earth, a thing from which all creatures shrink, save those 
curst beings of another world, who will not leave me ; — 
I am, in my desperation of this night, past all fear but 
that of the hell in which I exist from day to day. Give 
the alarm, cry out, I'efuse to shelter me. I will not hurt 


BARNABY RUDGE 


197 


you. But I will not be taken alive ; and so surely as 
you threaten me above your breath, I fall a dead man on 
this floor. The blood with which I sprinkle it, be on you 
and yours, in the name of the Evil Spirit that tempts 
men to their ruin ! ” 

As he spoke, he took a pistol from his breast, and 
firmly clutched it in his hand. 

“ Remove this man from me, good Heaven ! ” cried 
the widow. “ In thy grace and mercy, give him one 
minute’s penitence, and strike him dead ! ” 

“ It has no such purpose,” he said, confronting her. 
“ It is deaf. Give me to eat and drink, lest I do that, 
it cannot help my doing, and will not do for you.” 

“ Will you leave me, if I do thus much ? Will you 
leave me and return no more ? ” 

“ I will promise nothing,” he rejoined, seating himself 
at the table, “ nothing but this — I will execute my 
threat if you betray me.” 

She rose at length, and going to a closet or pantry in 
the room, brought out some fragments of cold meat and 
bread and put them on the table. He asked for brandy, 
and for water. These she produced likewise ; and he 
ate and drank with the voracity of a famished hound. 
All the time he was so engaged, she kept at the utter- 
most distance of the chamber, and sat there shuddering, 
but with her face towards him. She never turned her 
back upon him once ; and although when she passed him 
(as she was obliged to do in going to and from the cup- 
board) she gathered the skirts of her garment about her, 
as if even its touching his by chance were horrible to 
think of, still, in the midst of all this dread and terror, 
he kept her face directed to his own, and watched his 
every movement. 


J98 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


His repast ended — if that can be called one, which 
was a mere ravenous satisfying of the calls of hunger — 
he moved his chair towards the fire again, and warming 
himself before the blaze which had now sprung brightly 
up, accosted her once more. 

“ I am an outcast, to whom a roof above his head is 
often an uncommon luxury, and the food a beggar would 
reject is delicate fiire. You live here at your ease. Do 
you live alone ? ” 

“ I do not,” she made answer with an eflfort. 

“ Who dwells here besides ? ” 

“ One — it is no matter who. You had best begone, 
or he may find you here. Why do you linger ? ” 

“ For warmth,” he replied, spreading out his hands 
before the fire. “ For warmth. You are rich, per- 
haps ? ” 

“ Very,” she said faintly. “ Very rich. No doubt I 
am very rich.” 

“At least you are not penniless. You have some 
money. You were making purchases to-night.” 

“ I have a little left. It is but a few shillings.” 

“ Give me your purse. Y^ou had it in your hand at 
the door. Give it to me.” 

• She stepped to the table and laid it down. He 
reached across, took it up, and told tK’e contents into 
his hand. As he was counting them, she listened for 
a moment, and sprung towards him. 

“ Take what there is, take all, take more if more were 
there, but go before it is too late. I have heard a way- 
ward step without, I know full well. It will return 
directly. Begone.” 

“ What do you mean ? ” 

“ Do not stop to Jisk. I will not answer. Much as I 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


199 


dread to touch you, I would drag you to the door if I 
possessed the strength, rather than you should lose an 
instant. Miserable wretch ! fly from this place.” 

“ If there are spies without, 1 am safer here,” replied 
the man, standing aghast. “ I will remain here, and will 
not fly till the danger is past.” 

“ It is too late ! ” cried the widow, who had listened 
for the step, and not to him. “ Hark to that foot upon 
the ground. Do you tremble to hear it ! It is my son, 
my idiot son ! ” 

As she said this wildly, there came a heavy knocking 
at the door. He looked at her, and she at him. 

“ Let him come in,” said the man, hoarsely. “ I fear 
him less than the dark, houseless night. He knocks 
again. Let him come in ! ” 

“ The dread of this hour,” returned the widow, “ has 
been upon me all my life, and I will not. Evil will fall 
upon him, if you stand eye to eye. My blighted boy I 
Oh ! all good angels who know the truth — hear a poor 
mother’s prayer, and spare my boy from knowledge of 
this man ! ” 

“ He rattles at the shutters ! ” cried the man. “ He 
calls you. That voice and cry ! It was he who grappled 
with me in the road. Was it he ? ” 

She had sunk upon her knees, and so knelt down, 
moving her lips, but uttering no sound. As he gazed 
upon her, uncertain what to do or where to turn, the 
shutters flew open. He had barely time to catch a knife 
from the table, sheathe it in the loose sleeve of his coat, 
aide in the closet, and do all with the lightning’s speed, 
when Barnaby tapped at the bare glass, and raised the 
sash exultingly. 

^ Why, who can keep out Grip and me ! ” he cried, 


200 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


thrusting in his head, and staring round the room. “ Are 
you there, mother ? How long you keep us from the 
fire and light.” 

She stammered some excuse and tendered him her 
hand. But Barnaby sprung lightly in without assist- 
ance, and putting his arms about her neck, kissed her a 
hundred times. 

“We have been afield, mother — leaping ditches, 
scrambling through hedges, running down steep banks, 
up and away, and hurrying on. The wind has been 
blowing, and the rushes and young plants bowing and 
bending to it, lest it should do them harm, the cowards 
— and Grip — ha ha ha ! — brave Grip, who cares for 
nothing, and when the wind rolls him over in the dust, 
turns manfully to bite it — Grip, bold Grip, has quar- 
relled with every little bowing twig — thinking, he told 
me, that it mocked him — and has worried it like a bull- 
dog. Ha ha ha!” 

The raven, in his little basket at his master’s back, 
hearing this frequent mention of his name in a tone of 
exultation, expressed his sympathy by crowing like a 
cock, and afterwards running over his various phrases 
of speech with such rapidity, and in so many varieties 
of hoarseness, that they sounded like the murmurs of a 
crowd of people. 

“ He takes such care of me besides ! ” said Barnaby. 

Such care, mother I He watches all the time I sleep, 
and when I shut my eyes and make-believe to slumber, 
he practises new learning softly ; but he keeps his eye 
on me the whiie,_and if he sees me laugh, though never 
so little, stops directly. He won’t surprise me till he’s 
perfect.” 

The raven crowed again in a rapturous manner which 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


201 


plainly said, ‘‘ Those are certainly some of my character- 
istics, and I glory in them.” In the mean time, Barnaby 
closed the window and secured it, and coming to the 
fire-place, prepared to sit down with his face to the 
closet. But his mother prevented this, by hastily tak- 
ing that side herself, and motioning him towards the 
other. 

“ How pale you are to-night ! ” said Barnaby, lean- 
ing on his stick. “We have been cruel. Grip, and 
made her anxious ! ” 

Anxious in good truth, and sick at heart ! The listener 
held the door of his hiding-place open with his hand, and 
closely watched her son. Grip — alive to everything his 
master was unconscious of — had his head out of the 
basket, and in return was watching him intently with his 
glistening eye. 

“ He flaps his wings,” said Barnaby, turning almost 
quickly enough to catch the retreating form and closing' 
door, “ as if there were strangers here ; but Grip is 
wiser than to fancy that. Jump then!” 

Accepting this invitation with a dignity peculiar to 
himself, the bird hopped up on his master’s shoulder, 
from that to his extended hand, and so to the ground. 
Barnaby unstrapping the basket and putting it down in 
a corner with the lid open. Grip’s first care was to shut 
it down with all possible despatch, and then to stand 
upon it. Believing, no doubt, that he had now rendered 
it utterly impossible, and beyond the power of mortal 
man, to shut him up in it any more, he drew a great 
many corks in triumph, and uttered a corresponding 
number of hurrahs. 

“ Mother I ” said Barnaby, laying aside his hat and 
stick, and returning to the chair from which he had 


202 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


riser., “ I’ll tell you where we have been to-day, and 
what we have been doing, — shall I ? ” 

She took his hand in hers, and holding it, nodded the 
word she could not speak. 

“ You mustn’t tell,” said Barnaby, holding up his 
finger, “ for it’s a secret, mind, and only known to me, 
and Grip, and Hugh. We had the dog with us, but he’s 
not like Grip, clever as he is, and doesn’t guess it yet, 
I’ll wager. — Why do you look behind me so ? ” 

“ Did I ? ” she answered faintly. “ I didn’t know I 
did. Come nearer me.” 

“ You are frightened ! ” said Barnaby, changing color. 
“ Mother — you don’t see ” — 

“ See what ? ” 

“ There’s — there’s none of this about, is there ? ” he 
answered in a whisper, drawing closer to her and clasp- 
ing the mark upon his wrist. “ I am afraid there is, 
somewhere. You make my hair stand on end, and my 
flesh creep. Why do you look like that ? Is it in the 
room as I have seen it in my dreams, dashing the ceil- 
ing and the walls with red ? Tell me. Is it ? ” 

He fell into a shivering fit as he put the question, and 
shutting out the light with his hands, sat shaking in every 
limb until it had passed away. After a time he raised 
his head and looked about him. 

“ Is it gone ? ” 

“ There has been nothing here,” rejoined his mother, 
soothing him. “Nothing indeed, dear Barnaby. Look! 
You see there are but you and me.” 

He gazed at her vacantly, and, becoming reassured by 
degrees, burst into a wild laugh. 

“ But let us see,” he said, thoughtfully. “ Were we 
Salking ? Was it you and me ? Where have we 
been ? ” 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


203 


‘‘Nowhere but here.” 

“ Ay, but Hugh, and I,” said Barnaby, — “ That’s it 
Maypole Hugh, and I, you know, and Grip — we have 
been lying in the forest, and among the trees by Ihe 
road-side, with a dark-lantern after night came on, and 
the dog in a noose ready to slip him when the man ’ 
came by.” 

“ What man ? ” 

“ The robber ; him that the stars winked at. We 
have waited for him after dark these many nights, and 
we shall have him. I’d know him in a thousand. 
Mother, see here ! This is the man. Look ! ” 

He twisted his handkerchief round his head, pulled 
his hat upon his brow, wrapped his coat about him, and 
stood up before her : so like the original he counter- 
feited, that the dark figure peering out behind him might 
have passed for his own shadow. 

“ Ha, ha, ha ! We shall have him,” he cried, ridding 
himself of the semblance as hastily as he had assumed it. 

“ You shall see him, mother, bound hand and foot, and 
brought to London at a saddle-girth ; and you shall hear 
of him at Tyburn Tree if we have luck. So Hugh says. 
You’re pale again, and trembling. And why do you 
look behind me so ? ” 

“ It is nothing,” she answered. “ I am not quite well. 
Go you to bed, dear, and leave me here.” 

“ To bed ! ” he answered. “ I don’t like bed. I like 
X) lie before the fire, watching the prospects in the burn* 
ng coals — the rivers, hills, and dells, in the deep, red 
sunset, and the wild faces. I am hungry too, and Grip 
ias eaten nothing since broad noon. Let us to supper. 
Grip ! To supper, lad ! ” 

The raven flapped his wings, and, croaking his satis- 


204 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


faction, hopped to the feet of his master, and there held 
his bill open, ready for snapping up such lumps of meat 
as he should throw him. Of these he received about a 
score in rapid succession, without the smallest discom- 
posure. 

“ That’s all,” said Barnaby. - 

“ More ! ” cried Grip. “ More ! ” 

But it appearing for a certainty that no more was to 
be had, he retreated with his store ; and disgorging the 
morsels one by one from his pouch, hid them in various 
corners — taking particular care, however, to avoid the 
closet, as being doubtful of the hidden man’s propensities 
and power of resisting temptation. When he had con- 
cluded these arrangements, he took a turn or two across 
the room with an elaborate assumption of having nothing 
on his mind (but with one eye hard upon his treasure all 
the time), and then, and not till then, began to drag it 
out, piece by piece, and eat it with the utmost relish. 

Barnaby, for his part, having pressed his mother to 
eat, in vain, made a hearty supper too. Once, during 
the progress of his meal, he wanted more bread from the 
closet and rose to get it. She hurriedly interposed to 
prevent him, and summoning her utmost fortitude, passed 
into the recess, and brought it out herself. 

“ Mother,” said Barnaby, looking at her steadfastly as 
she sat down beside him, after doing so ; “ is to-day my 
birthday ? ” 

“ To-day ! ” she answered. “ Don’t you recollect it 
was but a week or so ago, and that summer, autumn, 
and winter have to pass before it comes again ? ” 

“ I remember that it has been so till now,” said Bar- 
naby. “ But I think to-day must be my birthday too, 
for all that.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


205 


She asked him why ? “ I’ll tell you why,” he said. 

I have always seen you — I didn’t let you know it, 
but I have — on the evening of that day grow very sad. 
I have seen you cry when Grip and I were most glad ; 
and look frightened with no reason ; and I have touched 
your hand, and felt that it was cold — as it is now. 
Once, mother (on a birthday that was, also) Grip and I 
thought of this after we went up-stairs to bed, and when 
it was midnight, striking one o’clock, we came down to 
your door to see if you were well. You were on your 
knees. I forget what it was you said. Grip, what was 
it we heard her say that night ? ” 

“ I’m a devil ! ” rejoined the raven promptly. 

“ No, no,” .said Barnaby. “ But you said something 
in a prayer ; and when you rose and walked about, you 
looked (as you have done ever since, mother, towards 
night on my birthday) just as you do now. I have 
found that out, you see, though I am silly. So I say 
you’re wrong ; and this must be my birthday — my 
birthday. Grip ! ” 

The bird received this information with a crow of such 
duration, as a cock, gifted with intelligence beyond all 
others of his kind, might u-sher in the longest day with. 
Then, as if he had well considered the sentiment, and 
regarded it as apposite to birthdays, he cried, “Never 
say die ! ” a great many times, and flapped his wings for 
emphasis. 

The widow tried to make light of Barnaby’s remark 
and endeavored to divert his attention to some new sub- 
ject; too easy a task at all times, as she knew. His 
supper done, Barnaby, regardless of her entreaties, 
stretched himself on the mat before the fire ; Grip 
oerched upon his leg, and divided his time between 


206 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


dozing in the grateful warmth, and endeavoring (as it 
presently appeared) to recall a new accomplishment he 
had been studying all day. 

A long and profound silence ensued, broken only by 
some change of position on the part of Barnaby, whose 
eyes were still wide open aiid intently fixed upon the 
fire ; or by an effort of recollection on the part of Grip, 
who would cry in a low voice from time to time, “ Polly 
put the ket — ” and there stop short, forgetting the re- 
mainder, and go off in a doze again. 

After a long interval, Barnaby’s breathing grew more 
deep and regular, and his eyes were closed. But even 
then the unquiet spirit of the raven interposed. “ Polly 
put the ket — ” cried Grip, and his master was broad 
awake again. 

At length Barnaby slept soundly ; and the bird with 
his bill sunk upon his breast, his breast itself puffed out 
into a comfortable alderman-like form, and his bright eye 
growing smaller and smaller, really seemed to be sub- 
siding into a state of repose. Now and then he muttered 
in a sepulchral voice, “ Polly put the ket — ” but very 
drowsily, and more like a drunken man than a reflecting 
raven. 

The widow, scarcely venturing- to breathe, rose from 
her seat. The man glided from the closet, and extin- 
guished the candle. 

•' — tie on,” cried Grip, suddenly struck with an idea 

and very much excited. “ — tie on. Hurrah ! Polly 
put the ket-tle on, we’ll all have tea ; Polly put the ket- 
tle on, we’ll all have tea. Hurrah, hurrah, hurrah ! I’m 
a devil. I’m a devil, I’m a ket-tle on. Keep up your spirits, 
Never say die. Bow wow wow. I’m a devil. I’m a ket-tle, 
I’m a — Polly put the ket-tle on, we’ll all have tea.” 


BAKNABY KUDGE. 


207 


They stood rooted to the ground, as though it had 
been a voice from the grave. 

But even this failed to awaken the sleeper. He turned 
over towards the fire, his arm fell to the ground, and his 
head drooped heavily upon it. The widow and her un- 
welcome visitor gazed at him and at each other for a 
moment, and then she motioned him towards the door. 

“ Stay,” he whispered. “ You teach your son well.” 

“ I have taught him nothing that you heard to-night. 
Depart instantly, or I will rouse him.” 

“ You are free to do so. Shall I rouse him ? ” 

“ You dare not do that.” 

I dare do anything, I have told you. He knows 
me well, it seems. At least I will know him.” 

“ Would you kill him in his sleep ? ” cried the 
widow, throwing herself between them. 

“ Woman,” he returned between his teeth, as he 
motioned her aside, “ I would see him nearer, and I 
will. If you want one of us to kill the other, wake 
him.” 

With that he advanced, and bending down over the 
prostrate form, softly turned back the head and looked 
into the face. The light of the fire was upon it, and 
its every lineament was revealed distinctly. He con- 
templated it for a brief space, and hastily uprose. 

“ Observe,” he whispered in the widow’s ear : ‘‘ In 
him, of whose existence I was ignorant until to-night, 
I have you in my power. Be careful how you use 
me. Be careful how you use me. I am destitute and 
starving, and a wanderer upon the earth. I may take 
a sure and slow revenge.” 

“ There is some dreadful meaning in your words. 
[ do not fathom it.” 


208 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


There is a meaning in them, and I see you fathom 
it to its very depth. You have anticipated it for years ; 
you have told me as much. I leave you to digest it. 
Do not forget my warning.” 

He pointed, as he left her, to the slumbering form, 
and stealthily withdrawing, made his way into the 
street. She fell on her knees beside the sleeper, and 
remained like one stricken into stone, until the tears 
which fear had frozen so long, came tenderly to her 
relief. 

“ Oh Thou,” she cried, “ who hast taught me such 
deep love for this one remnant of the promise of a 
happy life, out of whose affliction, even, perhaps the 
comfort springs that he is ever a relying, loving child 
to me — never growing old or cold at heart, but need- 
ing my care and duty in his manly strength as in his 
cradle-time — help him, in his darkened walk through 
this sad world, or he is doomed, and my poor heart 
is broken I ” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


209 


CHAPTER XVIIL 

Gliding along the silent streets, and holding his 
course where they were darkest and most gloomy, the 
man who had left the widow’s house crossed London 
Bridge, and arriving in the City, plunged into the 
back ways, lanes, and courts, between Cornhill and 
Smithfield ; with no more fixedness of purpose than to 
lose himself among their windings, and baflle pursuit, 
if any one were dogging his steps. 

It was the dead time of the night, and all was quiet. 
Now and then a drowsy watchman’s footsteps sounded 
on the pavement, or the lamplighter on his rounds 
went flashing past, leaving behind a little track of 
smoke mingled with glowing morsels of his hot red 
link. IJe hid himself even from these partakers of 
his lonely walk, and, shrinking in some arch or door- 
way while they passed, issued forth again when they 
were gone and so pursued his solitary way. 

To be shelterless and alone in the open country, 
1 tearing the wind moan and watching for day through 
the whole long weary night ; to listen to the falling 
rain, and crouch for warmth beneath the lee of some 
old barn or rick, or in the hollow of a tree ; are dis- 
mal things — but not so dismal as the wandering up 
and down where shelter is, and beds and sleepers are 
by thousands; a houseless rejected creature. To pace 
the echoing stones from hour to hour, counting the 
VOL. I. 14 


210 


BARNABY RUDGE- 


dull chimes of the clocks ; to watch the lights twink- 
ling in chamber-windows, to think what happy forget- 
fulness each house shuts in ; that here are children 
coiled together in their beds, here youth, here age, 
here poverty, here wealth, all equal in their sleep, and 
all at rest; to have nothing in common with the slum- 
bering world around, not even sleep. Heaven’s gift to 
all its creatures, and be ak"in to nothing but despair ; 
to feel, by the wretched contrast with everything on 
every hand, more utterly alone and cast away than in 
a trackless desert ; this is a kind of suffering, on which 
the rivers of great cities close full many a time, and 
which the solitude in erowds alone awakens. 

The miserable man paced up and down the streets 
— so long, so wearisome, so like each other — and 
often cast a wistful look towards the east, hoping to 
see the first faint streaks of day. But obdurate night 
had yet possession of the sky, and his disturbed and 
restless walk found no relief. 

One house in a back street was bright with the 
cheerful glare of lights ; there was the sound of music 
in it too, and the tread of dancers, and there were 
cheerful voices, and many a burst of laughter. To 
this place — to be near something that was awake and 
glad — he returned again and again ; and more than 
one of those who left it when the merriment was at 
its height, felt it a check upon their mirthful mood to 
see him flitting to and fro like an uneasy ghost. At 
last the guests departed, one and all ; and then the 
bouse was close shut up, and became as dull and silent 
as the rest. 

His wanderings brought him at one time to the city 
jail. Instead of hastening from it as a place of ill 


BARJ^ABY RUDGE. 


211 


omen, and one he had cause to shun, he sat down on 
some steps hard by, and resting his chin upon his hand, 
gazed upon its rough and frowning walls as though 
even they became a refuge in his jaded eyes. He 
paced it round and round, came back to the same spot, 
and sat down again. He did this often, and once, 
with a hasty movement, crossed to where some men 
were watching in the prison lodge, and had his - foot 
upon the steps as though determined to accost them. 
But looking round, he saw that the day began to 
break, and failing in his purpose, turned and fled. 

He was soon in the quarter he had lately traversed, 
and pacing to and fro again as he had done before. 
He was passing down a mean street, when from an 
alley close at hand some shouts of revelry arose, and 
there came straggling forth a dozen madcaps, whoop- 
ing and calling to each other, who, parting noisily, 
took different ways and dispersed in smaller groups. 

Hoping that some low place of entertainment which 
would afford him a safe refuge might be near at hand, 
he turned into this court when they were all gone, 
and looked about for a half-opened door, or lighted 
window, or other indication of the place whence they 
had come. It was so profoundly dark, however, and 
so ill-favored, that he concluded the^ had but turned 
up there, missing their way, and were pouring out 
again when he observed them. With this impression, 
and finding there was no outlet but that by which he 
had entered, he was about to turn, when from a grat- 
ing near his feet a sudden stream of light appeared, 
and the sound of talking came. He retreated into a 
doorway to see who these talkers were, and to listen 
to them. 


212 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


The light came to the level of the pavement as ho 
did this, and a man ascended bearing in his hand a 
torch. This figure unlocked and held open the grat- 
ing as for the passage of another, who presently ap- 
peared, in the form of a young man of small stature 
and uncommon self-importance, dressed in an obsolete 
and very gaudy fashion. 

“ Good-night, noble captain,” said he with the torch. 
“ Farewell, commander. Good luck, illustrious gen- 
eral ! ” 

In return to these compliments the other bade him 
hold his tongue, and keep his noise to himself ; and 
laid upon him many similar injunctions, with great 
fluency of speech and sternness of manner. 

Commend me, captain, to the stricken Miggs,” re- 
turned the torch-bearer in a lower voice. “ My cap- 
tain flies at higher game than Miggses. Ha, ha, ha! 
My captain is an eagle, both as respects his eye and 
soaring wings. My captain breaketh hearts as other 
bachelors break eggs at breakfast.” 

“ What a fool you are, Stagg 1 ” said Mr. Tappertit, 
stepping on the pavement of the court, and brushing 
from his legs the dust he had contracted in his pas- 
sage upward. 

“ His precious Iftnbs I ” cried Stagg, clasping one of 
his ankles. “ Shall a Miggs aspire to these propor- 
tions ! No, no, my captain. We will inveigle ladies 
fair, and wed them in our secret cavern. We will 
unite ourselves with blooming beauties, captain.” 

“ ril tell you what, my buck,” said Mr. Tappertit, 
releasing his leg ; “ I’ll trouble you not to take liber- 
ties, and not to broach certain questions unless certain 
questions are broached to you. Speak when you’re 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


213 


Bpoke to on particular subjects, and not otherways 
Hold the torch up till I’ve got to the end of the 
court, arwd then kennel yourself, do you hear ? ” 

“ I hear you, noble captain.” * 

“ Obey then,” said Mr. Tappertit haughtily. Gen- 
tlemen, lead on ! ” With which word of command 
(addressed to an imaginary staff or retinue) he folded 
his arms, and walked with surpassing dignity down 
the court. 

His obsequious follower stood holding the torch above 
his head, and then the observer saw for the first time, 
from his place of concealment, that he was blind. Some 
involuntary motion on his part caught the quick ear of 
the blind man, before he was conscious of having moved 
an inch towards him, for he turned suddenly and cried, 
“ Who’s there ? ” 

“ A man,” said the other, advancing. “ A friend ! ” 

“ A stranger ! ” rejoined the blind man. “ Strangers 
are not my friends. • What do you do there ? ” 

“ I saw your company come out, and waited here till 
they were gone. I want a lodging.” 

“ A lodging at this time ! ” returned Stagg, pointing 
towards the dawn as though he saw it. “ Do you know 
the day is breaking ? ” 

“ I know it,” rejoined the other, “ to my cost 
I have been traversing this iron-hearted town all 
night” 

“ You had better traverse it again,” said the blind man, 
preparing to descend, “ till you find some lodgings suit- 
able to your taste. I don’t let any.” 

“ Stay ! ” cried the other, holding him by the arm. 

“ I’ll beat this light about that hangdog face of yours 
(for hangdog it is, if it answers to your voice), and rouse 


214 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


the neighboi’hood besides, if you detain me,” said the 
blind man. “ Let me go. Do you hear ? ” 

“ Do you hear ! ” returned the other, chinking a few 
shillings together, and hurriedly pressing them into his 
hand. “ I beg nothing of you. I will pay for the shel- 
ter you give me. Death ! Is it much to ask of such as 
you ! I have come from the country, and desire to rest 
where there are none to question me. I am faint, ex- 
hausted, worn out, almost dead. Let me lie down, like a 
dog, before your fire. I ask no more than that. If you 
would be rid of me, I will depart to-morrow.” 

“ If a gentleman has been unfortunate on the road,” 
muttered Stagg, yielding to the other, who, pressing on 
him, had already gained a footing on the steps — “ and 
can pay for his accommodation ” — 

“ I will pay you with all I have. I am just now past 
the want of food, God knows, and wish but to purchase 
shelter. What companion have you below ? ” 

“ None.” 

“ Then fasten your grate there and show me the way. 
Quick ! ” 

The blind man complied after a moment’s hesitation, 
and they descended together. The dialogue had passed 
as hurriedly as the words could be spoken, and they 
stood in his wretched room before he had had time 
to recover from his first surprise. 

“ May I see where that door leads to, and what is be- 
yond ? ” said the man, glancing keenly round. “ You 
will not mind that ? ” 

“ I will show you myself. Follow me, or go before. 
Take your choice.” 

He bade him lead the way, and, by the light of 'the 
♦orch which his conductor held up for the purpose, in* 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


215 


spected all three cellars narrowly. Assured that the 
blind man had spoken truth, and that he lived there 
alone, the visitor returned with him to the first, in which 
a fire was burning, and flung himself with a deep groan 
upon the ground before it. 

His host pursued his usual occupation without seeming 
to heed him any further. But directly he fell asleep — 
and he noted his falling into a slumber, as readily as the 
keenest-sighted man could have done — he knelt down 
beside him, and passed his hand lightly but carefully 
over his face and person. 

His sleep was checkered with starts and moans, and 
sometimes with a muttered word or two. His hands 
were clinched, his brow bent, and his mouth firmly set. 
All this, the blind man accurately marked ; and as if his 
curiosity were strongly awakened, and he had already 
some inkling of his mystery, he sat watching him, if the 
expression may be used, and listening, until it was broad 
day. 


216 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


CHAPTER XIX. 

Dolly Varden’s pretty little head was -yet be- 
wildered by various recollections of the party, and her 
bright eyes were yet dazzled by a crowd of images, 
dancing before them like motes in the sunbeams, among 
which the effigy of one partner in particular did es- 
pecially figure, the same being a young coachmaker (a 
master in his own right) who had given her to under- 
stand, when he handed her into the chair at parting, that 
it was his fixed resolve to neglect his business from that 
time, and die slowly for the love of her — Dolly’s head, 
and eyes, and thoughts, and seven senses, were all in a 
state of flutter and confusion for which the party was ac- 
countable, although it was now three days old, when, as 
she was sitting listlessly at breakfast, reading all manner 
of fortunes (that is to say, of married and flourishing 
fortunes) in the grounds of her teacup, a step was heard 
in the workshop, and Mr. Edward Chester was descried 
through the glass door, standing among the rusty locks 
and keys, like love among the roses — for which apt 
comparison the historian may by no means take any 
credit to himself, the same being the invention, in a 
sentimental mood, of the chaste and modest Miggs, who, 
beholding him from the doorsteps she was then clean- 
ing, did, in her maiden meditation, give utterance to the 
simile. 

The locksmith, who happened at the moment to have 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


217 


Ills eyes thrown upward and his head backward, in an in* 
tense communing with Toby, did not see his visitor, until 
Mrs. Varden, more watchful than the rest, had desired 
Sira Tappertit to open the glass door and give him ad- 
mission — from which untoward circumstance the good 
lady argued (for she could deduce a precious moral from 
the most trifling event) that to take a draught of small 
ale in the morning was to observe a pernicious, irre- 
ligious, and Pagan custom, the relish whereof should be 
left to swine, and Satan, or at least to Popish persons, 
and should be shunned by the righteous as a work of 
sin and evil. She would no doubt have pursued her ad- 
monition much further, and would have founded on it a 
long list of precious precepts of inestimable value, but 
that the young gentleman standing by in a somewhat un- 
comfortable and discomfited manner while she read her 
spouse this lecture, occasioned her to bring it to a pre- 
mature conclusion. 

“ Pm sure you’ll excuse me, sir,” said Mrs. Varden, 
rising and courtesying. “ Varden is so very thought- 
less, and needs so much reminding — Sim, bring a chair 
here.” 

Mr. Tappertit obeyed, with a flourish implying that he 
did so, under protest. 

“And you can go, Sim,” said the locksmith. 

Mr. Tappertit obeyed again, still under protest ; and 
betaking himself to the workshop, began seriously to 
fear that he might find it necessary to poison his mas 
ter, before his time was out. ' 

In the mean time, Edward returned suitable replies to 
Mrs. Varden’s courtesies, and that lady brightened up 
very much ; so that when he accepted a dish of tea 
fi’om the fair, hands of Dolly, she was perfectly agree 
able. 


218 


BARNABT BUDGE. 


“ I am sure if' there’s anything we can do, — Varden, 
or I, or Dolly either, — to serve you, sir, at any time, 
you have only to say it, and it shall be done,” said 
Mrs. V. 

“ I am much obliged to you, I am sure,” returned Ed- 
ward. “ You encourage me to say that I have come 
here now, to beg your good offices.” 

Mrs. Varden was delighted beyond measure. 

“ It occurred to me that probably your fair daughter 
might be going ,to the Warren, either to-day or to-mor- 
row,” said Edward, glancing at Dolly ; “ and if so, and 
you will allow her to take charge of this letter. Ma’am, 
you will oblige me more than I can tell you. The truth 
is, that while I am very anxious it should reach its desti- 
nation, I have particular reasons for not trusting it to 
any other conveyance ; so that without your help, I am 
wholly at a loss.” 

“ She was not going that way, sir, either to-day, or to- 
morrow, nor indeed all next week,” the lady graciously 
rejoined, “ but we shall be very glad to put ourselves out 
of the way on your account, and if you wish it, you may 
depend upon its going to-day. You might suppose,” said 
Mrs. Varden, frowning at her husband, “ from Varden’s 
sitting there so glum and silent, that he objected to this 
arrangement ; but you must not mind that, sir, if you 
please. It’s his way at home. Out of doors, he can be 
cheerful and talkative enough.” 

Now, the fact was, that the unfortunate locksmith, 
blessing his stars to find his helpmate in such good 
humor, had been sitting \vith a' beaming face, hearing 
this discourse with a joy past all expression. Where 
fore this sudden attack quite took him by surprise. 

“ My dear Martha ” — he said. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


219 


“T)h yes, I dare say,” interrupted Mrs. Varden, with 
a smile of mingled scorn and pleasantry. “ Very dear 
We all know that.” 

“ No, but my good soul,” said Gabriel, “ you are quite 
mistaken. You are indeed. I was delighted to find 
you so kind and ready. I waited, my dear, anxiously, I 
assure you, to hear what you would say.” 

“You waited anxiously,” repeated Mrs. V. “Yes! 
Thank you, Varden. You waited, as you always do, 
that I might bear the blame, if any came of it. But 1 
am used to it,” said the lady with a kind of solemn 
titter, “ and that’s my comfort ! ” 

“ I give you my word, Martha ” — said Gabriel. 

“ Let me give you my word, my dear,” interposed his 
wife with a Christian smile, “that such discussions as 
these between married people, are much better left alone. 
Therefore, if you please Varden, we’ll drop the sub- 
ject. I have no wish to pursue it. I could. I might 
say a great deal. But I would rather not. Pray don’t 
say any more.” 

“ I don’t want to say any more,” rejoined the goaded 
locksmith. 

“ Well then, don’t,” said Mrs. Varden. 

“ Nor did I begin it, Martha,” added the locksmith, 
good-humoredly, “ I must say that.” 

“ You did not begin it, Varden ! ” exclaimed his wife, 
opening her eyes very wide and looking round upon the 
company, as though she would say. You hear this man 
“ You did not begin it, Varden I But you shall not say 
I was out of temper. No, you did not begin it, oh dear 
no, not you, my dear ! ” 

“ Well, well,” said the locksmith. “ That’s settled then.” 

“ Oh yes,” rejoined his wife, “ quite. If you like to 


220 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


say Dolly began it, my dear, I shall not contradicf you. 
I know my duty. I need know it, I am sure. I am 
often obliged to bear it in mind, when my inclination 
perhaps would be for the moment to forget it. Thank 
you, Varden.” And so, with a mighty show of humility 
and forgiveness, she folded her hands, and looked round 
again, with a smile which plainly said, “ If you desire to 
see the first and foremost among female martyrs, here 
she is, on view ! ” 

This little incident, illustrative though it was of Mrs. 
Varden’s extraordinary sweetness and amiability, had so 
strong a tendency to check the conversation and to dis- 
concert all parties but that excellent lady, that only a 
few monosyllables were uttered until Edward withdrew ; 
which he presently did, thanking the lady of the house a 
great many times for her condescension, and whispering 
in Dolly’s ear that he would call on the morrow, in case 
there should happen to be an answer to the note — 
which, indeed, she knew without his telling, as Barnaby 
and his friend Grip had dropped in on the previous 
night to prepare her for the visit which was then ter- 
minating. 

Gabriel, who had attended Edward to the door, came 
back with his hands in his pockets ; and, after fidget- 
ing about the room in a very uneasy manner, and cast- 
ing a great many sidelong looks at Mrs. Varden (who 
with the calmest countenance in the world was five 
fathoms deep in the Protestant Manual), inquired of 
Dolly how she meant to go. Dolly supposed by the 
Btage-coach, and looked at her lady mother, who find- 
ing herself silently appealed to, dived down at least an- 
other fathom into the Manual, and became unconscious 
of all earthly things. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


221 


“ Martha ” — said the locksmith. 

“ I hear you, Varden,” said his wife, without rising to 
the surface. 

“ I am sorry, my dear, you have such an objection 
to the Maypole and old John, for otherways as it’s a 
very fine morning, and Saturday’s not a busy day with 
us, we might have all three gone to Chigwell in the 
chaise, and had quite a happy day of it.” 

Mrs. Varden immediately closed the Manual, and 
bursting into tears, requested to be led up-stairs. 

“ What is the matter now, Martha ? ” inquired the 
locksmith. 

To which Martha rejoinedj “ Oh ! don’t speak to me,” 
and protested in agony that if anybody had told her so, 
she wouldn’t have believed it. 

“ But, Martha,” said Gabriel, putting himself in the 
way as she was moving off with the aid of Dolly’s shoul- 
der, “ wouldn’t have believed what ? Tell me what’s 
wrong now. Do tell me. Upon my soul I don’t know. 
Do you know, child? Damme!” cried ‘the locksmith, 
plucking at his wig in a kind of frenzy, “ nobody does 
know, I verily believe, but Miggs ! ” 

“ Miggs,” said Mrs. Varden faintly, and with symp- 
toms of approaching incoherence, “ is attached to me, 
and that is sufficient to draw down hatred upon her in 
this house. She is a comfort to me whatever she may 
be to others.” 

“ She’s no comfort to me,” cried Gabriel, made bold 
by despair. “ She’s the misery of my life. She’s all 
the plagues of Egypt in one.” 

“ She’s considered so, I have no doubt,” said Mrs. 
Varden. “ I was prepared for that ; it’s natural ; it’s 
of a piece with the rest. When you taunt me as you 


222 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


do to my face, how can I wonder that you taunt hei 
behind her back ! ” And here the incoherence coming 
on very strong, Mrs. Varden wept, and laughed, and 
sobbed, and shivered, and hiccoughed, and choked ; and 
said she knew it was very foolish, but she couldn’t help 
it ; and that when she was dead and gone, perhaps they 
would be sorry for it — which really under the circum- 
stances did not appear quite so probable as she seemed 
to think — with a great deal more to the same effect. 
In a word, she passed with great decency through all 
the ceremonies incidental to such occasions ; and being 
supported up-stairs, was deposited in a highly spasmodic 
state on her own bed, where Miss Miggs shortly after- 
wards flung herself upon the body. 

The philosophy of all this was, that Mrs. Varden 
wanted to go to Chigwell ; that she did not want to 
make any concession or explanation ; that she would 
only go on being implored and entreated so to do ; and 
that she would accept no other terms. Accordingly, 
after a vast amount of moaning and crying up-stairs, 
and much damping of foreheads, and vinegaring of 
temples, and hartshorning of noses, and so forth ; and 
after most pathetic adjurations from Miggs, assisted by 
warm brandy-and-water not over-weak, and divers other 
cordials, also ot a stimulating quality, administered at 
first in teaspoonfuls and afterwards in increasing doses, 
Hnd of which Miss Miggs herself partook as a preven- 
tive measure (for fainting is infectious) ; after all these 
remedies, and many more too numerous to mention, but 
not to take, had been applied ; and many verbal con- 
solations, moral, religious, and miscellaneous, had been 
superadded thereto ; the locksmith humbled himself, and 
the end was gained. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


223 


“ If it’s only for the sake of peace and quietness, 
father,” said Dolly, urging him to go up-stairs. 

“ Oh, Doll, Doll,” said her good-natured father. “ If 
you ever have a husband of your own” — 

Dolly glanced at the glass. 

“ Well, when you have,” said the locksmith, “ never 
faint, my darling. More domestic unhappiness has come 
of easy fainting, Doll, than from all the greater passions 
put together. Remember that, my dear, if you would 
be really happy, which you never can be, if your hus- 
band isn’t. And a word in your ear, my precious. Never 
have a Miggs about you ! ” 

With this advice he kissed his blooming daughter on 
the cheek, and slowly repaired to Mrs. Varden’s room ; 
where that lady, lying all pale and languid on her 
couch, was refreshing herself with a sight of her last 
new bonnet which Miggs, as a means of calming her 
scattered spirits, displayed to the best advantage at her 
bedside. 

‘‘ Here’s master, mim,” said Miggs. “ Oh, what a 
happiness it is when man and wife come round again ! 
Oh gracious, to think that him and her should ever 
have a word together I ” In the energy of these sen- 
timents, which were uttered as an apostrophe to the 
Heavens in general. Miss Miggs perched the bonnet 
on the top of her own head, and folding her hands, 
turned on her tears. 

“ I can’t help it,” cried Miggs. “ I couldn’t, if I was 
to be drownded in ’em. She has such a forgiving spirit ! 
She’ll forget all that has passed, and go along with you, 
sir — Oh, if it was to the world’s end, she’d go along 
with you.” 

Mrs. Varden with a faint smile gently reproved her 


224 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


attendant for this enthusiasm, and reminded her at the 
same time that she was far too unwell to venture out 
that day. 

“ Oh no, you’re not, mim, indeed you’re not,” said 
Miggs ; “ I repeal to master ; master knows you’re not, 
mim. The hair, and motion of the shay, will do you 
good, mim, and you must not give way, you must not 
raly. She must keep up mustn’t she, sir, for all our 
sakes ? I was a-telling her that, just now. She must 
remember us, even if she forgets herself. Master will 
persuade you, mim, I’m sure. There’s Miss Dolly’s a- 
going you know, and master, and you, and all so happy 
and so comfortable. Oli ! ” cried Miggs, turning on the 
tears again, previous to quitting the room in great 
emotion, “ I never see such a blessed one as she is for 
the forgiveness of her spirit, I never, never, never 
did. Nor more did master neither ; no, nor no one — 
never ! ” 

For five minutes or thereabouts, Mrs. Varden re- 
mained mildly opposed to all her husband’s prayers 
that she would oblige him by taking a day’s pleasure, 
but relenting at length, she sufiered herself to be per- 
suaded, and granting him her free forgiveness (the 
merit whereof, she meekly said, rested with the Man- 
ual and not with her), desired that Miggs might come 
and help her dress. The handmaid attended promptly, 
and it is but justice to their joint exertions to record 
that, when the good lady came down-stairs in course 
of time, completely decked out for the journey, she 
really looked as if nothing had happened, and appeared 
in the very best health imaginable. 

As to Dolly, there she was again, the very pink 
and pattern of good looks, in a smart little cherry* 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


225 


colored mantle, with a hood of the same drawn over 
ner head, and upon the top of that hood, a little straw 
hat trimmed with cherry-colored ribbons, and worn the 
merest trifle on one side — just enough in short to 
make it the wickedest and most provoking head-dress 
that ever malicious milliner devised. And not to speak 
of the manner in which these cherry-colored decora- 
tions brightened her eyes, or vied with her lips, or 
shed a new bloom on her face, she wore such a cruel 
little muff, and such a heartrending pair of shoes, and 
was so surrounded and hemmed in, as it were, by 
aggravations of all kinds, that when Mr. Tappertit, 
holding the horse’s head, saw her come out of the 
house alone, such impulses came over him to decoy 
her into the chaise and drive off like mad, that he 
would unquestionably have done it, but for certain 
uneasy doubts besetting him as to the shortest way to 
Gretna Green ; whether it was up the street >>1’ down, 
or up the right-hand turning or the left; and whether, 
supposing all the turnpikes to be carried by storm, the 
blacksmith in the end would marry them on credit; 
which by reason of his clerical office appeared, even 
to his excited imagination, so unlikely, that he hesi- 
tated. And while he stood hesitating, and looking 
post-chaises-and-six at Dolly, out came his master and 
his mistress, and the constant Miggs, and- the oppor- 
tunity was gone forever. For now the chaise creaked 
upon its springs, and Mrs. Varden was inside ; and 
now it creaked again, and more than ever, and the 
locksmith was inside ; and now it bounded once, as if 
its heart beat lightly, and Dolly was inside ; and now 
it was gone and its place was empty, and he and that 
dreary Miggs were standing in the street together. 

VOL. I. 15 


226 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


The hearty locksmith was in as good a humor as 
if nothing had occurred for the last twelve months to 
put him out of his way, Dolly was all smiles and 
graces, and Mrs. Varden was agreeable beyond all 
precedent. As they jogged through the streets talking 
of this thing and of that, who should be descried upon 
the pavement but that very coach-maker, looking so 
genteel that nobody would have believed he had ever 
had anything to do with a coach but riding in it, and 
bowing like any nobleman. To be sure Dolly was 
confused when she bowed again, and to be sure the 
cherry-colored ribbons trembled a little when she met 
his mournful eye, which secured to say, “ I have kept 
my word, I have begun, the business is going to the 
devil, and you’re the cause of it.” There he stood, 
rooted to the ground : as Dolly said like a statue ; and 
as Mrs. Varden said, like a pump ; till they turned 
the corner: and when her father thought it was like 
his impudence, and her mother wondered what he 
meant by it, Dolly blushed again till her very hood 
was pale. 

But on they went, not the less merrily for this, an/ 
there was the locksmith in the incautious fulness of hk 
heart “ pulling-up ” at all manner of places, and evin- 
cing a most intimate acquaintance with all the taverns 
on the road, and all the landlords and all the landla- 
dies, with whom, indeed, the little horse was on equally 
friendly terms, for he kept on stopping of his own 
accord. Never were people so glad to see other peo- 
ple as these landlords and landladies were to behold 
Mr. Varden and Mrs. Varden and Miss Varden ; and 
wouldn’t they get out, said one; and they really must 
walk up-stairs, said another ; and she would take it ill 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


227 


Riid be quite certain they were proud if they wouldn’t 
have a little taste of something, said a third ; and so 
on, that it really was quite a Progress rather than a 
ride, and one continued scene of hospitality from be- 
ginning to end. It was pleasant enough to be held in 
such esteem, not to mention the refreshments ; so Mrs. 
Varden said nothing at the time, and was all affability 
and delight — but such a body of evidence as she col- 
lected against the unfortunate locksmith that day, to 
be used thereafter as occasion might require, never 
was got together for matrimonial purposes. 

In course of time — and in course of a pretty long 
time too, for these agreeable interruptions delayed them 
not a little, — they arrived upon the skirts of the 
Forest, and riding pleasantly on among the trees, came 
at last to the Maypole, where the locksmith’s cheerful 
“ Yoho ! ” speedily brought to the porch old John, and 
after him young Joe, both of whom were so transfixed 
at sight of the ladies, that for a moment they were 
perfectly unable to give them any welcome, and could 
do nothing but stare. 

It was only for a moment, however, that Joe forgot 
himself, for speedily reviving he thrust his drowsy 
father aside — to Mr. Willet’s mighty and inexpressi- 
ble indignation — and darting out, stood ready to help 
them to alight. It was necessary for Dolly to get out 
first. Joe had her in his arms ; — yes, though for a 
Bpace of time no longer than you could count one in, 
Joe had her in his arms. Here was a glimpse of 
happiness ! 

It would be difficult to describe what a flat and 
commonplace affair the helping Mrs. Varden out after- 
tvards was, but Joe did it, and did it too with the 


^28 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


best grace in the world. Then old John, who, enter* 
taining a dull and foggy sort of idea that Mrs. Varden 
wasn’t fond of him, had been in some doubt whether 
she might not have come for purposes of assault and 
battery, took courage, hoped she was well, and offered 
to conduct her into the house. This tender being 
amicably received, they marched in together; Joe and 
Dolly followed, arm in arm, (happiness again !) and 
Varden brought up the rear. 

Old John would have it that they must sit in the 
bar, and nobody objecting, into the bar they went. 
All bars are snug places, but the Maypole’s was the 
very snuggest, cosiest, and completest bar, that ever 
the wit of man devised. Such amazing bottles in old 
oaken pigeon-holes ; such gleaming tankards dangling 
from pegs at about the same inclination as thirsty men 
would hold them to their lips ; such sturdy little Dutch 
kegs ranged in rows on shelves ; so many lemons 
hanging in separate nets, and forming the fragrant 
grove already mentioned in this chronicle, suggestive, 
with goodly loaves of snowy sugar stowed away hard 
by, of punch, idealized beyond all mortal knowledge; 
such closets, such presses, such drawers full of pipes, 
such places for putting things away in hollow window- 
seats, all crammed to the throat with eatables, drinka- 
bles, or savory condiments ; lastly, and to crown all ; 
as typical of the immense resources of the establish- 
- ment, and its defiances to all visitors to cut and come 
again, such a- stupendous cheese ! 

It is a poor heart that never rejoices — it must 
have been the poorest, weakest, and most watery heai*t 
that ever beat, which would not have warmed towards 
the Maypole bar. Mrs. Varden’s did directly. She 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


229 


could no more have reproached John Willet among 
those household gods, the kegs and bottles, lemons, 
pipes, and cheese, than she could have stabbed him 
with his own bright carving-knife. The order for 
dinner too — it might have soothed a savage. A 
It of fish,” said John to the cook, ‘^and some lamb- 
chops (breaded, with plenty of ketchup), and a good 
salad, and a roasi spring chicken, with a dish of sau- 
sages and mashed potatoes, or something of that sort.” 
Something of that sort! The resources of these inns! 
To talk carelessly about dishes, which in themselves 
were a first-rate holiday kind of dinner, suitable to 
one’s wedding-day, as something of that sort: mean- 
ing, if you can’t get a spring chicken, any other trifle 
•in the way of poultry will do — such as a peacock, 
perhaps ! The kitchen too, with its great broad cav- 
ernous chimney ; the kitchen, where nothing in the 
way of cookery seemed impossible; where you could 
believe in anything to eat, they chose to tell you of. 
Mrs. Varden returned from the contemplation of these 
wonders to the bar again, with ^ head quite dizzy 
and bewildered. Her house-keeping capacity was not 
large enough to comprehend them. She was obliged 
to go to sleep. Waking was pain in the midst of 
such immensity. 

Dolly in the mean while, whose gay heart and head 
ran upon other matters, passed out at the garden- 
door, and glancing back now and then (but of course 
not wondering whether Joe saw her), tripped away 
oy a path across the fields with which she was well 
acquainted, to discharge her mission at the Warren ; 
and this deponent hath been infoimed and verily be- 


230 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


lieves, that you might have seen many less pleasant 
objects than the cherry-colored mantle and ribbons as 
they went fluttering along the green meadows in the 
bright light of the day, like giddy things as they 
were. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


231 


CHAPTER XX. 

The proud consciousness of her trust, and the great 
importance she derived from it, might have advertised it 
to all the house if she had had to run the gauntlet of its 
inhabitants ; but as Dolly had played in every dull room 
and passage many and many a time, when a child, and 
had ever since been the humble friend of Miss Haredale, 
whose foster-sister she was, she was as free of the build- 
ing as the young lady herself. So, using no greater pre- 
caution than holding her breath and walking on tiptoe as 
she passed the library door, she went straight to Emma’s 
room as a privileged visitor. 

It was the liveliest room in the building. The cham- 
ber was sombre like the rest for the matter of that, but 
the presence of youth and beauty would make a prison 
cheerful (saving alas ! that confinement withers them), 
and lend some charms of their own to the gloomiest 
scene. Birds, flowers, books, drawing, music, and a hun- 
dred such graceful tokens of feminine loves and cares, 
filled it with more of life and human sympathy than the 
whole house besides seemed made to hold. There was 
heart in the room ; and who that has a heart, ever fails 
to recognize the silent presence of another ! 

Dolly had one undoubtedly, and it was not a tough 
one either, though there was a little mist of coquettish 
ness about it, such as sometimes surrounds that sun of 
life in its morning, and slightly dims its lustre. Thus, 


232 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


when Emma rose to greet her, and kissing her affection- 
ately on the cheek, told her, in her quiet way, that she 
had been very unhappy, the tears stood in Dolly’s eyes, 
and she felt more sorry than she could tell ; but next 
moment she happened to raise them to the glass, and 
really there was something there so exceedingly agree 
able, that as she sighed, she smiled, and felt surprisingly 
consoled. 

“ I have heard about it. Miss,” said Dolly, “ and it’s 
very sad indeed, but when things are at the worst they 
are sure to mend.” 

“ But are you sure they are at the worst ? ” asked 
Emma with a smile. 

“ Why, I don’t see how they can very well be more 
unpromising than they are ; I really don’t,” said Dolly. 
“And I bring something to begin with.” 

“ Not from Edward ? ” 

Dolly nodded and smiled, and feeling in her pockets 
(there were pockets in those days) with an affectation of 
not being able to find what she wanted, which greatly 
enhanced her importance, at length produced the letter. 
As Emma hastily broke the seal and became absorbed in 
its contents, Dolly’s eyes, by one of those strange acci- 
dents for which there is no accounting, wandered to the 
glass again. She could not help wondering wl.ether the 
coach-maker suffered very much, and quite pitied the 
poor man. 

It was a long letter — a very long letter, written close 
on all four sides of the sheet of paper, and crossed after- 
wards ; but it was not a consolatory letter, for as Emma 
read it she stopped from time to time to put her handker- 
chief to her eyes. To be sure Dolly marvelled greatly 
to see her in so much distress, for to her thinking a love- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


2:33 


affair ought to be one of the best jokes, and the slyest, 
merriest kind of thing in life. But she set it down in 
her own mind that all this came from Miss Haredale’s 
being so constant, and that if she would only take on with 
some other young gentleman — just in the most innocent 
way possible, to keep her first lover up to the mark — 
she would find herself inexpressibly comforted. 

“ I am sure that’s what I should do if it was me,** 
thought Dolly. “ To make one’s sweethearts miserable 
is well enough and quite right, but to be made miserable 
one’s self is a little too much ! ” 

However it wouldn’t do to say so, and therefore she 
sat looking on in silence. She needed a pretty consider- 
able stretch of patience, for when the long letter had 
been read once all through it was read again, and when 
it had been read twice all through it was read again. 
During this tedious process, Dolly beguiled the time in 
the most improving manner that occurred to her, by 
curling her hair on her fingers, with the aid of the 
looking-glass before mentioned, and giving it some kill- 
ing twists. 

Everything has an end. Even young ladies in love 
cannot read their letters forever. In course of time the 
packet was folded up, and it only remained to write the 
answer. 

But as this promised to be a work of time likewise, 
Emma said she would put it off until after dinner, and 
that Dolly must dine with her. As Dolly had made up 
her mind to do so beforehand, she required very little 
pressing ; and when they had settled this point, they 
went to walk in the garden. 

They strolled up and down the terrace walks, talking 
incessantly — at least, Dolly never left off once — and 


234 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


making that quarter of the sad and mournful house quite 
gay. Not that they talked loudly or laughed much, but 
they were both so very handsome, and it was such a 
breezy day, and their light dresses and dark curls ap- 
peared so free and joyous in their abandonment, and 
Emma was so fair, and Dolly so rosy, and Emma so 
delicately shaped, and Dolly so plump, and — in short, 
there are no flowers for any garden like such flowers, 
let horticulturists say what they may, and both house 
and garden seemed to know it, and to brighten up 
sensibly. 

After this, came the dinner and the letter-writing, and 
some more talking, in the course of which Miss Haredale 
took occasion to charge upon Dolly certain flirtish and 
inconstant propensities, which accusations Dolly seemed 
to think very complimentary indeed, and to be mightily 
amused with. Finding her quite incorrigible in this 
respect, Emma suffered her to depart ; but not before 
she had conflded to her that important and never-suffi- 
ciently-to-be-taken-care-of answer, and endowed her more- 
over with a pretty little bracelet as a keepsake. Having 
clasped it on her arm, and again advised her half in jest 
and half in earnest to amend her roguish ways, for she 
knew she was fond of Joe at heart (which Dolly stoutly 
denied, with a great many haughty, protestations that she 
hoped she could do better than that indeed ! and so 
forth), she bade her farewell ; and after calling her back 
to give her more supplementary messages for Edward, 
than anybody with tenfold the gravity of Dolly Varden 
could be reasonably expected to remember, at length 
dismissed her. 

Dolly bade her good-by, and tripping lightly down the 
tairs arrived at the dreaded library door, and was about 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


235 


to pass it again on tiptoe, when it opened, and behold ! 
there stood Mr. Haredale. Now, Dolly had from her 
childhood associated with this gentleman the idea of 
something grim and ghostly, and being at the moment 
conscience-stricken besides, the sight of him threw her 
into such a flurry that she could neither acknowledge 
his presence nor run away, so she gave a great start, 
and then with downcast eyes stood still and trembled. 

“ Come here, girl,” said Mr. Haredale, taking her by 
the hand. “ I want to speak to you.” 

“ If you please, sir, I’m in a hurry,” faltered Dolly, 
“ and — and you have frightened me by coming so sud- 
denly upon me, sir, — I would rather go, sir, if you’ll 
be so good as to let me.” 

“ Immediately,” said Mr. Haredale, who had by this 
time led her into the room and closed the door. “ You 
shall go directly. You have just left Emma ? ” 

“ Yes, sir, just this minute. — Father’s waiting for 
me, sir, if you’ll please to have the goodness ” 

“ I know. I know,” said Mr. Haredale. “ Answer 
me a question. What did you bring here to-day?” 

‘‘ Bring here, sir ? ” faltered Dolly. 

“You will tell me the truth, I am sure. Yes.” 

Dolly hesitated for a little while, and somewhat em- 
boldened by his manner, said at last, “ Well then, sir. 
It was a letter.” 

“ From Mr. Edward Chester, of course. And you 
are the bearer of the answer?” 

Dolly hesitated again, and not being able to decide 
upon any other course of action, burst into tears. 

“ You alarm yourself without cause,” said Mr. Hare- 
dale. “ Why are you so foolish ? Surely you can an- 
swer me. You know that I have but to put the question 


236 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


to Emma and learn the truth directly. Have you the 
answer with you ? ” 

Dolly had what is popularly called a spirit of her 
own, and being now fairly at bay, made the best of 
it. 

“ Yes, sir,” she rejoined, trembling and frightened as 
she was. “ Yes, sir, I have. You may kill me if you 
please, sir, but I won’t give it up. I’m very sorry, — 
but I won’t. There, sir.” 

“ I commend your firmness and your plain-speaking,” 
said Mr. Haredale. “ Rest assured that I have as little 
desire to take your letter as your life. You are a very 
discreet messenger and a good girl.” 

Not feeling quite certain, as she afterwards said, 
whether he might not be “ coming over her ” with these 
compliments, Dolly kept as far from him as she could, 
cried again, and resolved to defend her pocket (for the 
letter was there) to the last extremity. 

“ I have some design,” said Mr. Haredale after a 
short silence, during which a smile, as he regarded her, 
had struggled through the gloom and melancholy that 
was natural to his face, “ of providing a companion for 
my niece ; for her life is a very lonely one. Would you 
like the office ? You are the oldest friend she has, and 
the best entitled to it.” 

“ I don’t know, sir,” answered Dolly, not sure but he 
was bantering her ; “ I can’t say. I don’t know what 
‘Jiey might wish at home. I couldn’t give an opinion, 
Tiir.” 

“ If your friends had no objection, would you have 
any ? ” said Mr. Haredale. “ Come. There’s a plain 
question ; and easy to answer.” 

“ None at all that I know of, sir,” replied Dolly. “ I 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


237 


Bhould be very glad to be near Miss Emma of course, 
and always am.” * 

“ That’s well,” said Mr. Haredale. That is all I had 
to say. You are anxious to go. Don’t let me detain 
you.” 

Dolly didn’t let him, nor did she wait for him to try 
for the words had no sooner passed his lips than she 
was out of the room, out of the house, and in the fields 
again. 

The first thing to be done of course, when she came 
to herself, and considered what a flurry she had been 
in, was to cry afresh ; and the next thing, when she 
reflected how well she had got over it, was to laugh 
heartily. The tears once banished gave place to the 
smiles, and at last Dolly laughed so much that she was 
fain to lean against a tree, and give vent to her exulta- 
tion. When she could laugh no longer and was quite 
tired, she put her head-dress to rights, dried her eyes, 
looked back very merrily and triumphantly at the War- 
ren chimneys, which were just visible, and resumed her 
walk. 

The twilight had come on, and it was quickly growing 
dusk, but the path was so familiar to her from frequent 
traversing that she hardly thought of this, and certainly 
felt no uneasiness at being alone. Moreover, there was 
the bracelet to admire ; and when she had given it a 
good rub, and held it out at arm’s length, it sparkled and 
glittered so beautifully on her wrist, that to look at it 
in every point of view and with every possible turn of 
the arm, was quite an absorbing business. There was 
the letter too, and it looked so mysterious and knowing, 
when she took it out of her pocket, and it held, as she 
knew, so much inside, that to turn it over and over, and 


238 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


think about it, and wonder how it begun, and how it 
ended, and what it said*all through, was another matter 
of constant occupation. Between the bracelet and the 
letter, there was quite enough to do without thinking of 
anything else ; and admiring each by turns, Dolly went 
on gayly. 

As she passed through a wicket gate to where the 
path was narrow, and lay between two hedges garnished 
here and there with trees, she heard a rustling close at 
hand, which brought her to a sudden stop. She listened. 
All was very quiet, and she went on again — not abso 
lutely frightened, but a little quicker than before perhaps, 
and possibly not quite so much at her ease, for a check 
of that kind is startling. 

She had no sooner moved on again, than she was 
conscious of the same sound, which was like that of a 
person tramping stealthily among bushes and brush- 
wood. Looking towards the spot whence it appeared 
to come, she almost fancied she could make out a 
crouching figure. She stopped again. All was quiet 
as before. Oh she went once more decidedly faster 
now — and tried to sing softly to herself. It must be 
the wind. 

But how came the wind to blow only when she walked, 
and cease when she stood still ? She stopped invol- 
untarily as she made the reflection, and the rustling 
noise stopped likewise. She was really frightened now, 
and was yet hesitating what to do, when the bushes 
crackled and snapped, and a man came plunging through 
them, close before her. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


239 


CHAPTER XXL 

It was for the moment an inexpressible relief to 
Dolly, to recognize in the person who forced himself 
into the path so abruptly, and now stood directly in 
her way, Hugh of the Maypole, whose name she ut- 
tered in a tone of delighted surprise that came from 
her heart. 

“ Was it you ? ” she said, “ how glad I am to see 
you ! and how could you terrify me so ! ” 

In answer to which, he said nothing at all, but stood 
quite still, looking at her. 

“ Did you come to meet me ? ” asked Dolly. 

Hugh nodded, and muttered something to the effect 
tliat he had been waiting for her, and had expected 
her sooner. 

“ I thought it likely they would send,” said Dolly, 
greatly reassured by this. 

“ Nobody sent me,” was his sullen answer. “ I came 
of my own accord.” 

The rough bearing of this fellow, and his wild, un- 
couth appearance, had often filled the girl with a vague 
ipprehension even when other people were by, and had 
occasioned her to shrink from him involuntarily. The 
having him for an unbidden companion in so solitary 
a place, with the darkness fast gathering about them, 
renewed and even increased the alarm she had felt at 
first. 


240 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


If his manner had been merely dogged and passively 
fierce, as usual, she would have had no greater dislike 
to his company than she always felt — perhaps, indeed, 
would have been rather glad to have had him at hand. 
But there was something of coarse bold admiration in 
his look, which terrified her very much. She glanced 
timidly towards him, uncertain whether to go forward 
or retreat, and he stood gazing at her like a handsome 
satyr ; and so they remaiited for some short time with- 
out stirring or breaking silence. At length Dolly took 
courage, shot past him, and hurried on. 

“Why do you spend so much breath in avoiding me?” 
said Hugh, accommodating his pace to hers, and keeping 
close at her side. 

“ I wish to get back as quickly as I can, and you walk 
too near me,” answered Dolly. 

“ Too near ! ” said Hugh, stooping over her so that 
she could feel his breath upon her forehead. Why too 
near ? You’re always proud to me, mistress.” 

“ I am proud to no one. You mistake me,” answered 
Dolly. “ Fall back, if you please, or go on.” 

“ Nay, mistress,” he rejoined, endeavoring to draw her 
arm through his. “ I’ll walk with you.” 

She released herself, and clinching her little hand, 
struck* him with right good will. At this. Maypole 
Hugh burst into a roar of laughter, and passing his arm 
about her waist, held her in his strong grasp as easily as 
if she had been a bird. 

“ Ha, ha, ha ! Well done, mistress ! Strike again. 
You shall beat my face, and tear my hair, and pluck my 
beard up by the roots, and welcome for the sake of your 
bright eyes. Strike again, mistress. Do. Ha, ha, ha I 
I like it.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


241 


“ Let me go,” she cried, endeavoring with both her 
hands to push him off. “Let me go this moment.” 

“ You had as good be kinder to me, Sweetlips,” said 
Hugh. “ You had, indeed. Come. Tell me now. 
Why are you always so proud ? I don’t quarrel with 
you for it. I love you when you’re proud. Ha, ha, ha ! 
You can’t hide your beauty from a poor fellow ; that’s a 
comfort ! ” 

She gave him no answer, but as he had not yet 
checked her progress, continued to press forward as 
rapidly as she could. At length, between the hurry she 
had made, her terror, and the tightness of his embrace, 
her strength failed her,, and she could go no farther. 

“ Hugh,” cried the panting girl, “ good Hugh ; if you 
Vill leave me I will give you anything — everything I 
have — and never tell one word of this to any living 
creature.” 

“ You had best not,” he answered. “ Harkye, little 
dove, you had best not. All about here know me, and 
what I dare do if I have a mind. If ever you are going 
to tell, stop when the words are on your lips, and think 
of the mischief you’ll bring, if you do, upon some inno- 
cent heads that you wouldn’t wish to hurt a hair of. 
Bring trouble on me, and I’ll bring trouble and some- 
thing more on them in return. I care no more for them 
than for so many dogs ; not so much — why should I ? 
I’d sooner kill a man than a dog any day. I’ve never 
been sorry for a man’s death in all my life, and I have 
for a dog’s.” 

There was something so thoroughly savage in the 
manner of these expressions, and the looks and gestures 
by which they were accompanied, that her great fear of 
him gave her new strength, and enabled her by a sudden 

VOL. I. 36 


242 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


effort to extricate herself and run fleetly from him. But 
Hugh was as nimble, strong, and swift of foot, as any 
man in broad England, and it was but a fruitless ex- 
penditure of energy, for he had her in his encircling 
arms again before she had gone a hundred yards. 

“ Softly, darling — gently — would you By from rough 
Hugh, that loves you as well as any drawing-room gal- 
lant ? ” 

I would,” she answered, struggling to free herself 
again. “ I will. Help ! ” 

“ A fine for crying out,” said Hugh. “ Ha, ha, ha ! 
A fine, pretty one, from your lips. I pay myself! Ha, 
ha, ha I ” 

“ Help 1 Help ! Help ! ” As she shrieked with* the 
utmost violence she could exert, a shout was heard in 
answer, and another, and another. 

“ Thank Heaven I ” cried the girl in an ecstasy. ‘‘ Joe, 
dear Joe, this way. Help 1 ” 

Her assailant paused, and stood irresolute for a mo- 
ment, but the shouts drawing nearer and coming quick 
upon them, forced him to a speedy decision. He re- 
leased her, whispered with a menacing look, “ Tell him : 
and see what follows ! ” and leaping the hedge, was gone 
in an instant. Dolly darted off, and fairly ran into Joe 
Willet’s open arms. 

“ What is the matter ! are you hurt ! what was it ! 
who was it ? where is he ? what was he like ? ” with a 
great many encouraging expressions and assurances of 
safety, were the first words Joe poured forth. But poor 
little Dolly was so breathless and terrified that for some 
time she was quite unable to answer him, and hung upon 
liis shoulder, sobbing and crying as if her heart would 
break. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


243 


Joe had not the smallest objection to have her hanging 
Bn his shoulder ; no, not the least, though it crushed the 
cherry-colored ribbons sadly, and put the smart little hat 
out of all shape. But he couldn’t bear to see her cry ; 
it went to his very heart. He tried to console her, ben* 
over her, whispered to her — some say kissed her, bu 
that’s a fable. At any rate he said all the kind and tender 
things he could think of, and Dolly let him go on and 
didn’t interrupt him once, and it was a good ten minutes , 
before she was able to raise her head and thank him. 

“ What was it that frightened you ? ” said Joe. 

A man whose person was unknown to her had fol- 
lowed her, she answered ; he began by begging, and 
went on to threats of robbery, which he was on the point 
of carrying into execution, and would have executed, 
but for Joe’s timely aid. The hesitation and confusion 
with which she said this, Joe attributed to the fright she 
had sustained, and no suspicion of the truth occurred to 
him for a moment. 

“ Stop when the words are on your lips.” A hundred 
times that night, and very often afterwards, when the 
disclosure was rising to her tongue, Dolly thought of 
that, and repressed it. A deeply rooted dread of the 
man ; the conviction that his ferocious nature,- once 
roused, would stop at nothing ; and the strong assurance 
that if she impeached him, the full measure of his wrath 
and vengeance would be wreaked on Joe, who had pre 
served her ; these were considerations she had not the 
courage to overcome, and inducements to secrecy too 
DOwerful for her to surmount. 

Joe, for his part, was a great deal too happy to inquire 
very curiously into the matter; and Dolly being yet too 
tremulous to walk without assistance, they went forward 


244 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


very slowly, and in his mind very pleasantly, until the 
Maypole lights were near at hand, twinkling their cheer- 
ful welcome, when Dolly stopped suddenly, and with a 
half scream exclaimed, — 

The letter ! ” 

“ What letter ? ” cried Joe. 

“ That I was carrying — I had it in my hand. My 
bracelet too,” she said, clasping her wrist. “ I have lost 
them both ! ” 

“ Do you mean just now ? ” said Joe. 

“ Either I dropped them then, or they were taken 
from me,” answered Dolly, vainly searching her pocket 
and rustling her dress. “ They are gone, both gone. 
What an unhappy girl I am ! ” With these words poor 
Dolly, who to do her justice was quite as sorry for the 
loss of the letter as for her bracelet, fell a-crying again, 
and bemoaned her fate most movingly. 

Joe tried to comfort her with the assurance that di- 
rectly he had housed her safely in the Maypole, he 
would return to the spot with a lantern (for it was now 
quite dark) and make strict search for the missing ar- 
ticles, which there was great probability of his finding, 
as it was not hkely that anybody had passed that way 
since, and she was not conscious of their having been 
forcibly taken from her. Dolly thanked him very 
heartily for this offer, though with no great hope of his 
quest being successful ; and so, with many lamentations 
on her side, and many hopeful words on his, and much 
weakness on the part of Dolly, and much tender support- 
ing on the part of Joe, they reached the Maypole bar at 
last, where the locksmith and his wife and old John were 
yet keeping high festival. 

Mr. Willet received the intelligence of Dolly’s trouble 


BARNABY rudge. 


245 


with that surprising presence of mind and readiness of 
speech for which he was so eminently distinguished 
above all other men, Mrs. Varden expressed her sym- 
pathy for her daughter’s distress by scolding her roundly 
for being so late ; and the honest locksmith divided him- 
self between condoling with and kissing Dolly, and shak- 
ing hands heartily with Joe, whom he could not suffi- 
ciently praise or thank. 

In reference to this latter point, old John was far from 
agreeing with his friend ; for besides that he by no means 
approved of an adventurous spirit in the abstract, it oc- 
curred to him that if his son and heir had been seriously 
damaged in a scuffle, the consequences would assuredly 
have been expensive and inconvenient, and might per- 
haps have proved detrimental to the Maypole business. 
Wherefore, and because he looked with no favorable eye 
upon young girls, but rather considered that they and 
the whole female sex were a kind of nonsensical mistake 
on the part of Nature, he took occasion to retire and 
shake his head in private at the boiler; inspired by 
which silent oracle, he w'as moved to give Joe various 
stealthy nudges with his elbow, as a parental reproof 
and gentle admonition to mind his own business and not 
make a fool of himself. 

Joe, however, took down the lantern and lighted it; 
and arming himself with a stout stick, asked whether 
Hugh was in the stable. 

“ He’s lying asleep before the kitchen fire, sir,” said 
Mr. Willet. “ What do you want him for ? ” 

“ I want him to come with me to look after this brace- 
let and letter,” answered Joe. “ Hollo there ! Hugh ! ” 

Dolly turned pale as death, and felt as if she must 
faint forthwith. After a few moments, Hugh came stag- 


246 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


gering in, stretching himself and yawning according to 
custom, and presenting every appearance of having been 
roused from a sound nap. 

“ Here, sleepy-head,” said Joe, giving him the lantern. 

‘ Carry this, and bring the dog, and that small cudgel 
of yours. And woe betide the fellow if we come upon 
him.” 

“ What fellow 7 ” growled Hugh, rubbing his eyes and 
shaking himself. 

“ What fellow ? ” returned Joe, who was in a state of 
great valor and bustle ; “ a fellow you ought to know of, 
and be more alive about. It’s well for the like of you, 
lazy giant that you are, to be snoring your time away 
in chimney-corners, when honest men’s daughters can’t 
cross even our quiet meadows at nightfall without being 
set upon by footpads, and frightened out of their precious 
lives.” 

“ They never rob me,” cried Hugh with a laugh. ‘‘ I 
have got nothing to lose. But I’d as lief knock them at 
head as any other men. How many are there?” 

“ Only one,” said Dolly faintly, for everybody looked 
at her. 

“ And what was he like, mistress ? ” said Hugh with a 
glance at young Willet, so slight and momentary that the 
scowl it conveyed was lost on all but her. “ About my 
height ? ” 

“ Not — not so tall,” Dolly replied, scarce knowing 
what she said. 

“ His dress,” said Hugh, looking at her keenly, “ like 
— like any of ours now ? I know all the people here- 
abouts, and maybe could give a guess at the man, if I 
had anything to guide me.” 

Dolly faltered and turned paler yet; then answered 


BAliNABY RUDGE. 


247 


that he was wrapped in a loose coat and had his face 
hidden by a handkerchief, and that she could give no 
other description of him. 

“You wouldn’t know him if you saw him then, be- 
like ? said Hugh with a malicious grin. 

“ I should not,” answered Dolly, bursting into tears 
again. “ I don’t wish to see him. I can’t bear to think 
of him. I can’t talk about him any more. Don’t go to 
look for these things, Mr. Joe, pray don’t. I entreat you 
not to go with that man.” 

“ Not to go with me ! ” cried Hugh. “ I’m too rough 
for them all. They’re all afraid of me. Why, bless 
you mistress, I’ve the tenderest heart alive. I love 
all the ladies ma’am,” said Hugh, turning to the lock- 
smith’s wife. 

Mrs. Varden opined that if he did, he ought to be 
ashamed of himself ; such sentiments being more con- 
sistent (so she argued) with a benighted Mussulman or 
wild Islander than with a stanch Protestant. Arguing 
from this imperfect state of his morals, Mrs. Varden 
further opined that he had never studied the Manual. 
Hugh admitting that he never had, and moreover that he 
couldn’t read, Mrs. Varden declared with much severity, 
that he ought to be even more ashamed of himself than 
before, and strongly recommended him to save up his 
pocket-money for the purchase of one, and further to 
teach himself the contents with all convenient diligence 
She was still pursuing this train of discourse, whei 
Hugh, somewhat unceremoniously and irreverently, fol- 
lowed his young master out, and left her to edify the rest 
of the company. This she proceeded to do, and finding 
that Mr. Willet’s eyes were fixed upon her with an ap- 
pearance of deep attention, gradually addressed the whole 


248 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


of her discourse to him, whom she entertained with a 
moral and theological lecture of considerable length, in 
the conviction that great workings were taking place in 
his spirit. The simple truth was, however, that Mr. 
Willet, although his eyes were wide open and he saw a 
woman before him whose head by long and steady look- 
ing at seemed to grow bigger and bigger until it filled 
the whole bar, was to all other intents and purposes fast 
asleep ; and so sat leaning back in his chair with his 
hands in his pockets until his son’s return caused him to 
wake up with a deep sigh, and a faint impression that he 
had been dreaming about pickled pork and greens — a 
vision of his slumbers which was no doubt referable to 
the circumstance of Mrs. Varden’s having frequently 
pronounced the word “ Grace ” with much emphasis ; 
which word, entering the portals of Mr. Willet’s brain 
as they stood ajar, and coupling itself wdth the words 
“ before meat,” which were there ranging aboutj did in 
time suggest a particular kind of meat together with 
that description of vegetable which is usually its com- 
panion. 

The search was wholly unsuccessful. Joe had groped 
along the path a dozen times, and among the grass, and 
in the dry ditch, and in the hedge, but all in vain. Dolly, 
who was quite inconsolable for her loss, wrote a note to 
Miss Haredale giving her the same account of it that 
she had given at the Maypole, which Joe undertook to 
deliver as soon as the family were stirring next day. 
That done, they sat down to tea in the bar, where there 
was an uncommon display of buttered toast, and — in 
order that they might not grow faint for want of sus- 
tenance, and might have a decent halting-place or half- 
way house between dinner and supper — a„few savory 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


249 


trifles in the shape of great rashers of broiled ham, 
which being well cured, done to a turn, and smoking 
hot, sent forth a tempting and delicious fragrance. 

Mrs. Varden was seldom very Protestant at meals, 
unless it happened that they were underdone, or over- 
done, or indeed that anything occurred to put her out of 
humor. Her spirits rose considerably on beholding these 
goodly preparations, and from the nothingness of good 
works, she passed to the somethingness of ham and toast 
with gi’eat cheerfulness. Nay, under the influence of 
these wholesome stimulants, she sharply reproved her 
daughter for being low and despondent (which she con- 
sidered an unacceptable frame of mind), and remarked, 
as she held her owm plate for a fresh supply, that it 
would be well for Dolly who pined over the loss of a 
toy and a sheet of paper, if she would reflect upon the 
voluntary sacrifices of the missionaries in foreign parts 
who lived chiefly on salads. 

The proceedings of such a day occasioned various 
fluctuations in the human thermometer, and especially 
in instruments so sensitively and delicately constructed 
as Mrs. Varden. Thus, at dinner Mrs. V. stood at sum- 
mer heat ; genial, smiling, and delightful. After dinner, 
in the sunshine of the wine, she went up at least half-a- 
dozen degrees, and was perfectly enchanting. As its 
effect subsided, she fell rapidly, went to sleep for an 
hour or so at temperate, and woke at something below 
freezing. Now she was at summer heat again, in the 
shade ; and when tea was over, and old John, producing 
a bottle of cordial from one of the oaken cases, insisted 
on her sipping two glasses thereof in slow succession, 
she stood steadily at ninety for one hour and a quarter. 
Profiting by experience, the locksmith took advantage 


250 


BARN A BY RUDGE. 


of this geixial weather to smoke his pipe in the porch, 
and in consequence of this prudent management, he was 
fully prepared, when the glass went down again, to start 
homewards directly. 

The horse was accordingly put in, and the chaise 
brought round to the door. Joe, who would on no ac- 
count be dissuaded from escorting them until they had 
passed the most dreary and solitary part of the road, led 
out the gray mare at the same time ; and having helped 
Dolly into her seat (more happiness !) sprung gayly into 
the saddle. Then, after many good-nights, and admoni- 
tions to wrap up, and glancing of lights, and handing in 
of cloaks and shawls, the chaise rolled away, and Joe 
trotted beside it — on Dolly’s side, no doubt, and pretty 
close to the wheel too. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


251 


CHAPTER XXII. 

It was a fine bright night, and for all her lowness of 
spirits Dolly kept looking up at the stars in a manner so 
bewitching (and she knew it !) that Joe was clean out of 
his senses, and plainly showed that if ever a man were 
— not to say over head and ears, but over the Monu- 
ment and the top of Saint Paul’s in love, that man was 
himself. The road was a very good one ; not at all a 
jolting road, or an uneven one ; and yet Dolly held the 
side of the chaise with one little hand, all the way. If 
there had been an executioner behind him with an up- 
lifted axe ready to chop ofi* his head if he touched that 
hand, Joe couldn’t have helped doing it. From putting 
his own hand upon it as if by chance, and taking it away 
again after a minute or so, he got to riding along without 
taking it off at all ; as if he, the escort, were bound to 
do that as an important part of his duty, and had come 
out for the purpose. The most curious circumstance 
about this little incident was, that Dolly didn’t seem to 
know of it. She looked so innocent and unconscious 
when she turned her eyes on Joe, that it was quite 
provoking. 

. She talked though ; talked about her fright, and about 
Joe’s coming up to rescue her, and about her gratitude, 
and about her fear that she might not have thanked him 
enough, and about their always being friends from that 
‘ime forth — and about all that sort of thing. And when 


252 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Joe said, not friends he hoped, Dolly was quite surprised, 
and said not enemies she hoped; and when Joe said, 
couldn’t they be something much better than either, 
Dolly all of a sudden found out a star which was brighter 
than all the other stars, and begged to call his attention 
to the same, and was ten thousand times more innocent 
and unconscioOs than ever. 

In this manner they travelled along, talking very little 
above a whisper, and wishing the road could be stretched 
out to some dozen times its natural length — at least that 
was Joe’s desire — when, as they were getting clear of 
the forest and emerging on the more frequented road, 
they heard behind them the sound of a horse’s feet at a 
round trot, which growing rapidly louder as it drew 
nearer, elicited a scream from Mrs. Varden, and the 
cry “ a friend ! ” from the rider, who now came pant- 
ing up, and checked his *horse beside them. 

“ This man again ! ” cried Dolly, shuddering. 

‘ “ Hugh ! ” said Joe. “ What errand are you upon ? ” 

“ I come to ride back with you,” he answered, glanc- 
ing covertly at the locksmith’s daughter. “ He sent me.” 

“ My father ! ” said poor Joe ; adding under his breath, 
with a very unfilial apostrophe, “ Will he never think 
me man enough to take care of myself!” 

u Ay I ” returned Hugh to the first part of the in- 
quiry. “ The roads are not safe just now,” he says, 
“and you’d better have a companion.” 

“ Ride on then,” said Joe. “ I’m not going to turn 
yet.” 

Hugh complied, and they went on again. It was his 
whim or humor to ride immediately before the chaise, 
and from this position he constantly turned his head, and 
looked back. Dolly felt that he looked at her, but she 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


253 


averted her eyes and feared to raise them once, so great 
was the dread with which he had inspired her. 

This interruption, and the consequent wakefulness of 
Mrs. Varden, who had been nodding in her sleep up to 
this point, except for a minute or two at a time, when 
she roused herself to scold the locksmith for audaciously 
taking hold of her to prevent her nodding herself out of 
the chaise, put a restraint upon the whispered conversa- 
tion, and made it difficult of resumption. Indeed, before 
they had gone another mile, Gabriel stopped at his wife’s 
desire, and that good lady protested she would not hear 
of Joe’s going a step farther on any account whatever. 
Jt was in vain for Joe to protest on the other hand that 
he was by no means tired, and would turn back presently, 
and would see them safely past such and such a point, 
and so forth. Mrs. Varden was obdurate, and being so 
was not to be overcome by mortal agency. 

“ Good-night — if I must say it,” said Joe, sorrow- 
fully. 

“ Good-night,” said Dolly. She would have added, 
" Take care of that man, and pray don’t trust him,” but 
he had turned his horse’s head, and was standing close 
to them. She had therefore nothing for it but to suffer 
Joe to give her hand a gentle squeeze, and when the 
chaise had gone on for some distance, to look back 
and wave it, as he still lingered on the spot where 
they had parted, with the tall dark figure of Hugh 
beside him. 

What she thought about, going home ; and whether 
Ihe coach-maker held as favorable a place in her medita- 
tions as he had occupied in the morning, is unknown. 
They reached home at last — at last, for it was a long 
way, made none the shorter by Mrs. Varden’s grumbling. 


254 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Miggs hearing the sound of wheels was at the door ina* 
mediately. 

“ Here they are, Simmun ! Here they are ! ” cried 
Miggs, clapping her hands, and issuing forth to help her 
mistress to alight. Bring a chair, Simmun. Now 
a’n’t you the better for it, mira ? Don’t you feel more 
yourself than you would have done if you’d have stopped 
at home ? Oh, gracious ! how cold you are ! Goodness 
me, sir, she’s a perfect heap of ice.” 

“ I can’t help it, my good girl. You had better take 
her in to the fire,” said the locksmith. 

“ Master sounds unfeeling, mim,” said Miggs, in a tone 
of commiseration, “ but such is not his intentions, I’m 
sure. After what he has seen of you this day, I never 
will believe but that he has a deal more affection in his 
heart than to speak unkind. Come in and sit yourself 
down by the fire; there’s a good dear — do.” 

Mrs. Varden complied. The locksmith followed with 
his hands in his pockets, and Mr. Tappertit trundled 
off with the chaise to a neighboring stable. 

“Martha, my dear,” said the locksmith, when they 
reached the parlor, “ if you’ll look to Dolly yourself, 
or let somebody else do it, perhaps it will be only kind 
and reasonable. She has been frightened you know, and 
is not at all well to-night.” 

In fact, Dolly had thrown herself upon the sofa, quite 
regardless of all the little finery of which she had been 
BO proud in the morning, and with her face buried in her 
bands was crying very much. 

At first sight of this phenomenon (for Dolly was by 
no means accustomed to displays of this sort, rather 
learning from her mother’s example to avoid them as 
much as possible) Mrs. Varden expressed her belief that 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


255 


never was any woman so beset as she : that her life was 
a continued scene of trial ; that whenever she was dis- 
posed to be well and cheerful, so sure were the people 
around her to throw, by some means or other, a damp 
upon her spirits ; and that, as she had enjoyed herself 
that day, and Heaven knew it was very seldom she did 
enjoy herself, so she was now to pay the penalty. To 
all such propositions Miggs assented freely. Poor Dolly, 
however, grew none the better for these restoratives, but 
rather worse, indeed ; and seeing that she was really ill, 
both Mrs. Varden and Miggs were moved to compassion, 
and tended her in earnest. 

But even then, their very kindness shaped itself into 
their usual course of policy, and though Dolly was in a 
swoon, it was rendered clear to the meanest capacity, 
that Mrs. Varden was the sufferer. Thus when Dolly 
began to get a little better, and passed into that stage in 
which matrons hold that remonstrance and argument 
may be successfully applied, her mother represented to 
her, with tears in her eyes, that if she had been flurried 
and worried that day, she must remember it was the ^ 
common lot of humanity, and in especial of womankind, 
who through the whole of their existence must expect no 
less, and were bound to make up their minds to meek 
I endurance and patient resignation. Mrs. Varden en- 

i treated her to remember that one of these days she 

j would, in all probability, have to do violence to her feel- 
i ings so far as to be married ; and that marriage, as she 
1 might see every day of her life (and truly she did) was 
I a state requiring great fortitude and forbearance. She 
I represented to her in lively colors, that if she (Mrs. V.) 
had not, in steering her course through this vale of tears, 
been supported by a strong principle of duty which alone 


256 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


upheld and prevented her from drooping, she must have 
been in her grave many years ago ; in which case she 
desired to know what would have become of that errant 
spirit (meaning the locksmith), of whose eyes she was 
the very apple, and in whose path she was, as it were, a 
shining light and guiding star ? 

Miss Miggs also put in her word to the same effect. 
She said that indeed and indeed Miss Dolly might take 
pattern by her blessed mother, who, she always had said, 
and ahvays would say, though she were to be hanged, 
drawn, and quartered for it next minute, was the mildest, 
amiablest, forgivingest-spirited, longest-sufferingest female 
as ever she could have believed ; the mere narration of 
whose excellencies had w’orked such a wholesome change 
in the mind of her own sister-in-law, that, whereas, be- 
fore, she and her husband lived like cat and dog, and 
were in the habit of exchanging brass candlesticks, pot- 
lids, flat-irons, and other such strong resentments, they 
were now the happiest and affectionatest couple upon 
earth ; as could be proved any day on application at 
Golden Lion Court, number tw^enty-sivin, second bell- 
’ handle on the right-hand door-post. After glancing at 
herself as a comparatively worthless vessel, but still as 
one of some desert, she besought her to bear in mind 
that her aforesaid dear and only mother wms of a weakly 
constitution and excitable temperament, who had con- 
stantly to sustain afflictions in domestic life, compared 
with w'hich, thieves and robbers were as nothing, and yet 
never sunk down or gave way to despair or wrath, but, 
in prize-fighting phraseology, always came up to time 
with a cheerful countenance, and went in to win as if 
nothing had happened. When Miggs had finished her 
solo, her mistress struck in again, and the two together 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


257 


performed a duet to the same purpose ; the burden 
being, that Mrs. Varden was persecuted perfection, and 
Mr. Varden, as the representative of mankind in that 
apartment, a creature of vicious and brutal habits, ut- 
terly insensible to the blessings he enjoyed. Of so re- 
fined a character, indeed, was their talent of assault 
under the mask of sympathy, that when Dolly, re- 
covering, embraced her father tenderly, as in vindica- 
tion of his goodness, Mrs. Varden expressed her solemn 
hope that this would be a lesson to him for the remain- 
der of his life, and that he would do some little justice to 
a woman’s nature ever afterwards — in which aspiration 
Miss Miggs, by divers sniffs and coughs, more significant 
than the longest oration, expressed her entire concur- 
rence. 

But the great joy of Miggs’s heart was, that she not 
only picked up a full account of what had happened, 
but had the exquisite delight of conveying it to Mr. 
Tappertit for his jealousy and torture. For that gen- 
tleman, on account of Dolly’s indisposition, had been 
requested to take his supper in the workshop, and it 
was conveyed thither by Miss Miggs’s own fair hands. 

“ Oh, Simmun ! ” said the young lady, “ such goings 
on to-day ! Oh, gracious me, Simmun ! ” 

Mr. Tappertit, who was not in the best of humors, 
and who disliked Miss Miggs more when she laid her 
hand on her heart and panted for breath than at any 
other time, as her deficiency of outline was most ap 
parent under such circumstances, eyed her over in his 
loftiest style, and deigned to express no curiosity what- 
ever. 

“ I never heard the like, nor nobody else,” pursued 
Miggs. “ The idea of interfering with her. What peo- 

VOL. I. 17 


258 


BAKNABY RUDGE. 


pie can see in her to make it worth their while to do 
60 , that’s the joke — he, he, he ! ” 

Finding there was a lady in the case, Mr. Tappertit 
haughtily requested his fair friend to be more explicit, 
and demanded to know what she meant by “ her.” 

“ Why, that Dolly,” said Miggs,. with an extremely 
sharp emphasis on the name. “ But, oh upon my word 
and honor, young Joseph Willet is a brave one ; and 
he do deserve her, that he do.” 

“ Woman ! ” said Mr. Tappertit, jumping off the coun- 
ter on which he was seated; “beware!” 

“ My stars, Simmun 1 ” cried Miggs, in affected aston- 
ishment. “ You frighten me to death ! What’s the 
matter ? ” 

“ There are strings,” said Mr. Tappertit, flourishing 
his bread-and-cheese knife in the air, “ in the human 
heart that had better not be wibrated. That’s what's 
the matter.” 

“ Oh, very well — if you’re in a huff,” cried Miggs, 
turning away. 

“ Huff or no huff,” said Mr. Tappertit, detaining her 
by the wrist. “ What do you mean, Jezebel ? What 
were you going to say ? Answer me 1 ” 

Notwithstanding this uncivil exhortation, Miggs gladly 
did as she was required ; and told him how that their 
young mistress, being alone in the meadows after dark, 
had been attacked by three or four tall men, who would 
have certainly borne her away and perhaps murdered 
her, but for the timely arrival of Joseph Willet, who 
with his own single hand put them all to flight, and 
rescued her; to the lasting admiration of his fellow- 
creatures generally, and to the eternal love and gratitude 
of Dolly Varden. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


2o9 


“Very good,” said Mr. Tappertit, fetching a long 
breath when the tale was told, and rubbing his hair up 
till it stood stiff and straight on end all over his head. 
“ His days are numbered.” 

«Oh, Simmun!” 

“ I tell you,” said the ^prentice, “ his days are num 
bered. Leave me. Get along with you.” 

Miggs departed at his bidding, but less because of 
his bidding than because she desired to chuckle in secret. 
When she had given vent to her satisfaction, she re- 
turned to the parlor ; where the locksmith, stimulated 
by qufetness and Toby, had become talkative, and was 
disposed to take a cheerful review of the occurrences of 
the day. But Mrs. Varden, whose practical religion 
(as is not uncommon) was usually of the retrospective 
order, cut him short by declaiming on the sinfulness of 
such junketings, and holding that it was high time to go 
to bed. To bed therefore she withdrew, with an aspect 
as grim and gloomy as that of the Maypole^s own state 
couch ; and to bed the rest of the establishment soon 
afterwards repaired. 


260 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


CHAPTER XXIII. 

Twilight had given place to night some hours, and 
k: was high noon in those quarters of the town in 
which “ the world ” condescended to dwell — the world 
being then, as now, of very limited dimensions and 
easily lodged — when Mr. Chester reclined upon a sofa 
in his dressing-room in the Temple, entertaining him- 
self with a book. 

He was dressing, as it seemed, by easy stages, and 
having performed half. the journey was taking a long 
rest. Completely attired as to his legs and feet in the 
trimmest fashion of the day, he had yet the remainder 
of his toilet to perform. The coat was stretched, like 
a refined scarecrow, on its separate horse ; the waist- 
coat was displayed to the best advantage ; the various 
ornamental articles of dress were severally set out 
in most alluring order ; and yet he lay dangling his 
legs between the sofa and the ground, as intent upon 
his book as if there were nothing but bed before 
him. 

• “ Upon my honor,” he said, at length raising his eyes 
to the ceiling with the air of a man who was reflect- 
ing seriously on what he had read ; “ upon my honor, the 
most masterly composition, the most delicate thoughts, 
the finest code of morality, and the most gentlemanly 
sentiments in the universe ! Ah Ned, Ned, if you would 
but form your mind by such precepts, we should have 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


261 


but one common feeling on every subject tliat could 
possibly arise between us ! ” 

This apostrophe was addressed, like the rest of his 
remarks, to empty air : for Edward was not present, and 
the father was quite alone. 

“ My Lord Chesterfield,” he said, pressing his hand 
tenderly upon the book as he laid it down, “ if I could 
but have profited by j-our genius soon enough to have 
formed my son on the model you have left to all wise 
fathers, both he and I would have been rich men. Shak- 
speare was undoubtedly very fine in his way ; Milton 
good, though prosy ; Lord Bacon deep, and . decidedly 
knowing; but the writer who should be his country’s 
pride, is my Lord Chesterfield.” 

He became thoughtful again, and the toothpick was in 
requisition. 

“ I thought I was tolerably accomplished as a man of 
the world,” he continued, “ I flattered myself that I was 
pretty well versed in all those little arts and graces 
which distinguish men of the world from boors and 
peasants, and separate their character from those in- 
tensely vulgar sentiments which are called the national 
character. Apart from any natural prepossession in 
my own favor, I believed I was. Still, in every page 
of this enlightened writer, I find some captivating hy- 
pocrisy which has never occurred to me before, or some 
superlative piece of selfishness to which I was utterly 
a stranger. I should quite blush for myself before this 
stupendous creature, if, remembering his precepts, one 
might blush at anything. An amazing man ! a noble- 
man indeed ! any King or Queen may make a Lord, 
Out only the Devil himself — and the Graces — can 
make a Chesterfield.” 


262 


BAKNABY RUDGE. 


Men who are thoroughly false and hollow, seldom 
try to hide those vices from themselves ; and yet in 
the very act of avowing them, they lay claim to the 
virtues they feign most to despise. “ For,” say they, 
“ this is honesty, this is truth. All mankind are like 
us, but they have not the candor to avow it.” The 
more they affect to deny the existence of any sincer 
ity in the world, the more they would be thought to 
possess it in its boldest shape; and this is an unconscious 
compliment to Truth on the part of these philosophers, 
which will turn the laugh against them to the Day of 
Judgment. 

iVIr. Chester, having extolled his favorite author as 
above recited, took up the book again in the excess of 
his admiration and was composing himself for a further 
perusal of its sublime morality, when he was disturbed 
by a noise at the outer door ; occasioned as it seemed by 
the endeavors of his servant to obstruct the entrance of 
some unwelcome visitor. 

“ A late hour for an importunate creditor,” he said, 
raising his eyebrows with as indolent an expression of 
wonder as if the noise were in the street, and one with 
which he had not the smallest possible concern. “ Much 
after their accustomed time. The usual pretence I 
suppose. No doubt a heavy payment to make up 
to-morrow. Poor fellow, he loses time, and time is 
money, as the good proverb says — I never found i 
out though. Well. What now ? You know I am no 
at home.” 

“A man, sir,” replied the servant, who was to the 
full as cool and negligent in his way as his master, 

has brought home the riding-whip you lost the other 
day. I told him you were out, but he said he was 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


263 


to wait while I brought it in, and wouldn’t go till I 
did.” ’ 

“ He was quite right,” returned his master, “ and 
you’re a blockhead, possessing no judgment or discretion 
whatever. Tell him to come in, and see that he rubs 
his shoes for exactly five minutes first.” 

The man laid the whip on a chair, and withdrew. 
The master, who had only heard his foot upon the 
ground and had not taken the trouble to turn round 
and look at him, shut his book, and pursued the train 
of ideas his entrance had disturbed. 

“ If time were money,” he said, handling his snuff*- 
box, “ I would compound with my creditors, and give 
them — let me see — how much a day ? There’s my 
nap after dinner — an hour — they’re extremely wel- 
come to that, and to make the most of it. In the 
morning, between my breakfast and the paper, I could 
spare them another hour ; in the evening, before din- 
ner, say another. Three hours a day. They might 
pay themselves in calls, with interest, in twelve months. 
I think I shall propose it to them. Ah, my centaur, 
are you there ? ” 

“ Here I am,” replied Hugh, striding in, followed by 
a dog as rough and sullen as himself ; “ and trouble 
enough I’ve had to get here. What do you ask me to 
come for, and keep me out when I do come?” 

“ My good fellow,” returned the other, raising his 
head a little from the cushion and carelessly surveying 
him from top to toe, “ I am delighted to see you, and to 
have, in your being here, the very best proof that you 
^re not kept out. How are you ? ” 

“ I’m well enough,” said Hugh impatiently. 

“ You look a perfect marvel of health. Sit down.” 


264 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


‘‘ Fd rather stand,” said Hugh. 

“ Please yourself, ray good fellow,” returned Mr 
Chester rising, slowly pulling cflf the loose robe he wore, 
and sitting down before the dressing-glass. “ Please 
yourself by all means.” 

Having said this in the politest and blandest tone 
possible, he went on dressing, and took no further no- 
tice of his guest, who stood in the same spot as un- 
certain what to do next, eying him sulkily from time 
to time’. 

“ Are you going to speak to me, master ? ” he said, 
after a long silence. 

“ My worthy creature,” returned Mr. Chester, “ you 
are a little ruffled and out of humor. I’ll wait till 
you’re quite yourself again. I am in no hurry.” 

This behavior had its intended effect. It humbled 
and abashed the man, and made him still more irreso- 
lute and uncertain. Hard w^ords he could have returned, 
violence he would have repaid with interest ; but this 
cool, complacent, contemptuous, self-possessed reception, 
caused him to feel his inferiority more completely than 
the most elaborate arguments. Everything contributed 
to this effect. His own rough speech, contrasted with 
the soft persuasive accents of the other ; his rude bear- 
ing, and Mr. Chester’s polished manner ; the disorder 
and negligence of his ragged dress, and the elegant 
attire he saw before him : with all the unaccustomed 
luxuries and comforts of the room, and the silence that 
gave him leisure to observe these things, and feel how 
ill at ease they made him ; all these influences, which 
have ioo often some effect on tutored minds and become 
of almost resistless power when brought to bear on 
such a mind as his, quelled Hugh completely. Ho 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


2 Ho 

moved by little and little nearer to Mr. Chester’s cluiir, 
and glancing over his shoulder at the reflection of his 
face in the glass, as if seeking for some encouragement 
in its expression, said at length, with a rough attempt 
at conciliation. 

“ Are you going to speak to me, master, or am I to 
go away ? ” 

“ Speak you,” said Mr. Chester, “ speak you, good 
fellow. I have spoken, have I not ? I am waiting 
for you.” 

“ Why, look’ee sir,” returned Hugh with increased 
embarrassment, “ am I the man that you 'privately left, 
your whip with before you rode away from the May- 
pole, and told to bring it back whenever he might want 
to see you on a certain subject ? ” 

“ No doubt the same, or you have a twin brother,” 
said Mr. Chester, glancing at the reflection of his anx- 
ious face ; “ which is not probable, I should say.” 

. “ Then I have come, sir,” said Hugh, “ and I have 
brought it back, and something else along with it. A 
letter sir, it is, that I took from the person who had 
charge of it.” As he spoke, he laid upon^ the dressing- 
table Dolly’s last epistle. The very letter that had cost 
her so much trouble. 

“ Did you obtain this by force, my good fellow ? ” said 
Mr. Chester, casting his eye upon it without the least 
perceptible surprise or pleasure. 

“ Not quite,” said Hugh. “ Partly.” 

“ Who was the messenger from whom you took it ? ” 

“ A woman. One Varden’s daughter.” 

“ Oh indeed,” said Mr. Chester, gayly. “ What else 
did you take from her?” 

“What else?” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


2()6 

“ Yes,” said the Dther, in a drawling manner, for be 
was fixing a very small patch of sticking-plaster on a 
very small pimple near the corner of his mouth. “What 
else ? ” 

“ Well — a kiss,” replied Hugh, after some hesitation. 
^ “ And what else ? ” 

I “ Nothing.” 

“ I think,” said Mr. Chester, in the same easy tone, 
and smiling twice or thrice to try if the patch adhered 
— “I think there was something else. I have heard a 
trifle of jewelry spoken of — a mere trifle — a thing of 
such little value, indeed, that you may have forgotten it. 
Do you remember anything of the kind — such as a 
bracelet now, for instance ? ” 

Hugh with a muttered oath thrust his hand into his 
breast, and drawing the bracelet forth, wrapped in a 
scrap of hay, was about to lay it on the table likewise, 
when his patron stopped his hand and bade him put it 
up again. 

You took that for yourself, my excellent friend,” he 
said, “and may keep it. I am neither a thief, nor a 
receiver.* Don’t show it to me. You had better hide 
it again, and lose no time. Don’t let me see where 
you put it either,” he added, turnings away his head. 

“You’re not a receiver !” said Hugh bluntly, despite 
the increasing awe in which he held him. “ What do 
you call that, master ? ” striking the letter with his 
heavy hand. 

“ I call that quite another thing,” said Mr. Chester 
coolly. “ I shall prove it presently, as you will see. 
You are thirsty, I suppose ? ” 

Hugh drew his sleeve across his lips, and gruffly 
answered yes. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


267 


“ Step to that closet, and bring me' a bottle you will 
Bee there, and a glass.” 

He obeyed. His patron followed him with his eyes, 
and when his back was turned, smiled as he had never 
done when he stood beside the mirror. On his return, 
he filled the glass and bade him drink. That dram 
despatched, he poured him out another, and another. 

“ How many can you bear ? ” he said, filling the glass 
again. 

“ As many as you like to give me. Pour on. Fill 
high. A bumper with a bead in the middle ! Give me 
enough of this,” he added, as he tossed it down his hairy 
throat, “ and Pll do murder if you ask me ! ” 

“ As I don’t mean to ask you, and you might possibly 
do it without being invited if you went on much further,’* 
said Mr. Chester with great composure, “ we will stop, 
if agreeable to you my good friend, at the next glass. — 
You were drinking before you came here.” 

“ I always am when I can get it,” cried Hugh boister- 
ously, waving the empty glass above his head, and throw- 
ing himself into a rude dancing attitude. “ I always am. 
Why not ? Ha, ha, ha ! What’s so good to me as this ? 
What ever has been ? What else has kept away the' 
cold and bitter nights, and driven hunger off* in starving 
limes ? What else has given me the strength and cour- 
age of a man, when men would have left me to die, a 
puny child ? I should never have had a man’s heart but 
for this. I should have died in a ditch. Where’s he 
who when I was a weak and sickly wretch, with trem- 
bling legs and fading sight, bade me cheer up, as this 
did ? I never knew him ; not I. I drink to the drink, 
master. Ha, ha, ha ! ” 

“ You are an exceedingly cheerful young man,” said 


268 


BAKNABY BUDGE. 


Mr. Chester, putting on his cravat with great delibera- 
tion, and slightly moving his head from side to side to 
settle his chin in its proper place. “ Quite a boon com- 
panion.” 

“ Do you see this hand, master,” said Hugh, “ and 
this arm ? ” baring the brawny limb to the elbow. “ It 
was once mere skin and bone, and would have been dust 
in some poor church-yard by this time, but for the drink.” 

“You may cover it,” said Mr. Chester, “ it’s sufficiently 
real in your sleeve.” 

“ I should never have been spirited up to take a kiss 
from the proud little beauty, master, but for the drink,” 
cried Hugh. “ Ha, ha, ha ! It was a good one. As 
sweet as honeysuckle I warrant you. I thank the drink 
for it. I’ll drink to the drink again, master. Fill me 
one more. Come. One more ! ” 

“ You are such a promising fellow,” said his patron, 
putting on his waistcoat with great nicety, and taking no 
heed of this request, “ that I must caution you against 
having too many impulses from the drink, and getting 
hung before your time. What’s your age ? ” 

“ I don’t know.” 

“ At any rate,” said Mr. Chester, “ you are young 
enough to escape what I may call a natural death for 
some years to come. How can you trust yourself in my 
hands on so short an acquaintance, with a halter round 
your neck. What a confiding nature yours must be ! ” 

Hugh fell back a pace or two and surveyed him with 
a look of mingled terror, indignation, and surprise. Re- 
garding himself in the glass with the same complacency 
as before, and speaking as smoothly as if he were dis- 
cussing some pleasant chitchat of the town, his patron 
went on : — 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


269 


“ Robbery on the king’s highway, my young friend, is 
a very dangerous and ticklish occupation. It is pleasant, 
I have no doubt, while it lasts ; but like many other 
pleasures in this transitory world, it seldom lasts long. 
And really if, in the ingenuousness of youth, you open 
your heart so readily on the subject, I am afraid your 
career will be an extremely short one.” 

“ How’s this ? ” said Hugh. “ What do you talk of, 
master ? Who was it set me on ? ” 

“ Who ? ” said Mr. Chester, wheeling sharply round, 
and looking full at him for the first time. “ I didn’t hear 
you. Who was it ? ” 

Hugh faltered, and muttered- something which was not 
audible. 

“ Who was it ? I am curious to know,” said Mr. 
Chester, with surpassing affability. “ Some rustic beauty 
perhaps ? But be cautious, my good friend. They are 
not always to be trusted. Do take my advice now, and 
be careful of yourself.” With these words he turned to 
the glass again, and went on with his toilet. 

Hugh would have answered him that he, the ques- 
tioner himself, had set him on, but the words stuck in his 
throat. The consummate art with which his patron had 
led him to this point, and managed the whole conversa- 
tion, perfectly bafiled him. He did not doubt that if he 
had made the retort which was on his lips when Mr. 
Chester turned round and questioned him so keenly, he 
would straightway have given him into custody and had 
him dragged before a justice with the stolen property 
upon him ; in which case it was as certain he would 
have been hung as it was that he had been born. The 
ascendancy which it was the purpose of the man of the 
world to establish over this savage instrument, was 


270 


BAKNABY BUDGE. 


gained from tliat time. Hugh’s submission was com- 
plete. He dreaded him beyond description ; and felt 
that accident and artifice had spun a web about him, 
which at a touch from such a master-hand as his, would 
bind him to the gallows. 

With these thoughts passing through his mind, and 
yet wondering at the very same time how he who came 
there rioting in the confidence of this man (as he 
thought), should be so soon and so thoroughly subdued, 
Hugh stood cowering before him, regarding him uneasily 
from time to time, while he finished dressing. When he 
had done so, he took up the letter, broke the seal, and 
throwing himself back in his chair, read it leisurely 
through. 

“Very neatly worded upon my life ! Quite a woman’s 
letter, full of what people call tenderness, and disinter- 
estedness, and heart, and all that sort of thing ! ” 

As he spoke, he twisted it up, and glancing lazily 
round at Hugh as though he w^ould say “ You see this?” 
held it in the flame of the candle. When it was in a 
full blaze, he tossed it into the grate, and there it smoul- 
dered away. 

“ It was directed to my son,” he said, turning to Hugh, 
“ and you did quite right to bring it here. I opened it 
on my own responsibility, and you see what I have done 
with it. Take this for your trouble.” 

Hugh stepped forward to receive' the piece of money 
he held out to him. As he put it in his hand he 
added : — 

“ If you should happen to find anything else of this 
sort, or to pick up any kind of information you may 
think I would like to have, bring it here, will you, my 
good fellow ? ” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


271 


This was said with a smile which implied — or Hugh 
thought it did — “ fail to do so at jour peril ! ” He an- 
swered that he would. 

“ And don’t,” said his patron, with an air of the vei’j 
kindest patronage, “ don’t be at all downcast or uneasy 
respecting that little rashness we have been speaking of. 
Your neck is as safe in mj hands, my good fellow, as 
though a baby’s fingers clasped it, I assure you.. — Take 
another glass. You are quieter now.” 

Hugh accepted it from his hand, and looking stealthily 
at his smiling face, drank the contents in silence. 

“ Don’t you — ha, ha ! — don’t you drink to the drink 
any more ? ” said Mr. Chester, in his most winning 
manner. 

“ To you, sir,” was the sullen answer, with something 
approaching to a bow. “ I drink to you.” 

“ Thank you. God bless you. By the by, what is 
your name, my good soul ? You are called Hugh, I 
know, of course — your other name ? ” 

“I have no other name.” 

“ A very strange fellow ! Do you mean that you 
never knew one, or that you don’t choose to tell it ? 
Which?” 

“ I’d tell it if I could,” said Hugh, quickly. “ I can’t. 
I have been always called Hugh ; nothing more. I 
never knew, nor saw, nor thought about a father ; and I 
was a boy of six — that’s not very old — when they 
lung my mother up at Tyburn for a couple of thousand 
men to stare at. They might have let her live. She 
was poor enough.” 

“ How very sad ! ” exclaimed his patron, with a con- 
desQending smile. “ I have no doubt she was an ex- 
ceedingly fine woman.” 


272 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ You see that dog of mine ? ” said Hugh, abruptly. 

“ Faithful, I dare say?” rejoined his patron, looking 
at him through his glass ; “ and immensely clever ? 
Virtuous and gifted animals, whether man or beast, 
always are so very hideous.” 

“ Such a dog as that, and one of the same breed, was 
the only living thing except me that howled that day,” 
said Hugh. “ Out of the two thousand odd — there was 
a larger crowd for its being a w^oman — the dog and I 
alone had any pity. If he’d have been a man, he’d have 
been glad to be quit of her, for she had been forced to 
keep hjm lean and half-starved ; but being a dog, and 
not having a man’s sense, he was sorry.” 

“It was dull of the brute, certainly,” said Mr. Chester, 
“ and very like a brute.” 

Hugh made no rejoinder, but whistling to his dog, 
who sprung up at the sound and came jumping and 
sporting about him, bade his sympathizing friend good- 
night. 

“ Good-night,” he returned. “ Remember ; you’re 
safe with me — quite safe. So long as you deserve it, 
my good fellow, as I hope you always will, you have a 
friend in me, on whose silence you may rely. Now do 
be careful of yourself, pray do, and consider what jeop- 
ardy you might have stood in. Good-night ! bless 
you.” 

Hugh truckled before the hidden meaning of these 
words as much as such a being could, and crept out of 
the door so submissively and subserviently — with an 
air, in short, so different from that with which he had 
entered — that his patron on being left alone, smiled 
more than ever. 

“ And yet,” he said, as he took a pinch of snuff, “ I do 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


273 


not like their having hanged his mother. The fellow 
has a fine eye, and I am sure she was handsome. But 
very probably she was coarse — red-nosed perhaps, and 
had clumsy feet. Ay, it was all for the best, no doubt.” 

With this comforting reflection, he put on his coat, 
took a farewell glance at the glass, and summoned his 
man, who promptly attended, followed by a chair and its 
two bearers. t 

“Foh!” said Mr. Chester. “The very atmosphere 
that centaur has breathed, seems tainted with the cart 
and ladder. Here, Peak, bring some scent and sprinkle 
the floor ; and take away the chair he sat upon, and air 
it ; and dash a little of that mixture upon me. I am 
stifled!” 

The man obeyed ; and the room and its master being 
both purified, nothing remained for Mr. Chester but to 
demand his hat, to fold it jauntily under his arm, to take 
his seat in the chair and be carried off ; humming a fash- 
ionable time. 


VOL. 1. 


18 


274 


BARNABY RUDGE 


CHAPTER XXIV. 

How the accomplished gentleman spent the evening 
in the midst of a dazzling and brilliant circle ; how he 
enchanted all those with whom he mingled by the grace 
of his deportment, the politeness of his manner, the vi- 
vacity of his conversation, and the sweetness of his 
voice ; how it was observed in every corner, that Ches- 
ter was a man of that happy disposition that nothing 
ruffled him, that he was one on whom the world’s cares 
and errors sat lightly as his dress, and in whose smiling 
face a calm and tranquil mind was constantly reflected ; 
how honest men, who by instinct knew him better, 
bowed down before him nevertheless, deferred to his 
every word, and courted his favorable notice ; how peo- 
ple, who really had good in them, went with the stream, 
and fawned and flattered, and approved, and despised 
themselves while they did so, and yet had not the cour- 
age to resist; how, in short, he was one of those who 
are received and cherished in society (as the phrase is) 
by scores who individually would shrink from and be 
repelled by the object of their lavish regard ; are things 
of course, which will suggest themselves. Matter so 
commonplace needs but a passing glance, and there an 
end. 

The despisers of mankind — apart from the mere 
fools and mimics, of that creed — are of two sorts. 
They who believe their merit neglected and unappreci- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


275 


ated, raake up one class ; they who receive adulation and 
flattery, knowing their own worthlessness, compose the 
other. Be sure that the coldest-hearted misanthropes 
are ever of this last order. 

Mr. Chester sat up in bed next morning, sipping his 
coffee, and remembering with a kind of contemptuous 
satisfaction how he had shone last night, and how l^e had 
been caressed and courted, when his servant brought in 
a very small scrap of dirty paper, tightly sealed in two 
places, on the inside whereof was inscribed in pretty 
large text these words. “ A friend. Besiring of a con- 
ference. Immediate. Private. Burn it when you’ve 
read it.” 

“ Where in the name of the Gunpowder Plot did you 
pick up this ? ” said his master. 

It was given him by a person then waiting at the 
door, the man replied. 

“ With a cloak and dagger ? ” said Mr. Chester. 

With nothing more threatening about him, it appeared, 
than a leather apron and a dirty face. “ Let him come 
in.” In he came — Mr. Tappertit ; with his hair still 
on end, and a great lock in his hand, which he put down 
on the floor in the middle of the chamber as if he were 
about to go through some performances in which it* was 
a necessary agent. 

“ Sir,” said Mr. Tappertit with a low bow, “ I thank 
you for this condescension, and am glad to see you. 
Pardon the menial office in which I am engaged, sir, 
and extend your sympathies to one, who, humble as his 
appearance is, has inn’ard workings far above his sta- 
tion.” * 

Mr. Chester held the bed-curtain farther back, and 
looked at him with a vague impression that he was some 


276 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


maniac, who had not only broken open the door of his 
place of confinement, but had brought away the lock. 
Mr. Tappertit bowed again, and displayed his legs to 
'die best advantage. 

“ You have heard, sir,” said Mr. Tappertit, laying his 
hand upon his breast, “ of G. Varden Locksmith and 
bell-hanger and repairs neatly executed in town and 
country, Clerkenwell, London ? ” 

“ What then ? ” asked Mr. Chester. 

“ I am his ’prentice, sir.” 

“ What then ? ”• 

“Ahem!” said Mr. Tappertit. “Would you permit 
me to shut the door, sir, and will you further, sir, give 
me your honor bright, that what passes between us is in 
the strictest confidence ? ” 

Mr. Chester laid himself calmly down in bed again, 
and turning a perfectly undisturbed face towards the 
strange apparition, which had by this time closed the 
door, begged him to speak out, and to be as rational as 
he could, without putting himself to any very great per- 
sonal inconvenience. 

“ In the first place, sir,” said Mr. Tappertit, producing 
a small pocket-handkerchief, and shaking it out of the 
folds,* “ as I have not a card about me (for the envy of 
masters debases us below that level) allow me to offer 
the best substitute that circumstances will admit of. If 
you will take that in your own hand, sir, and cast your 
eye on the right-hand corner,” said Mr. Tappertit, offer- 
ing it with a graceful air, “ you will meet with my cre- 
demials.” 

“ Thank you,” an^vered Mr. Chester, politely accept- 
mg, and turning to some blood-red characters at one end. 
“ ‘ Four. Simon Tappertit. One.’ Is that the ” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


277 


‘‘ Without the numbers, sir, that is my name,” replied 
the ^prentice. “ They are merely intended as directions 
to the washerwoman, and have no connection with myself 
or family. Your name, sir,” said Mr. Tappertit, look- 
ing very hard at his nightcap, “ is Chester, I suppose ? 
You needn’t pull it off, sir, thank you. I observe E. C. 
from here. We will take the rest for granted.” 

“ Pray, Mr. Tappertit,” said Mr. Chester, “ has that 
complicated piece of ironmongery which you have done 
me the favor to bring with you, any immediate connec- 
tion with the business we are to discuss ? ” 

“ It has not, sir,” rejoined the ’prentice. “ It’s going 
to be fitted on a ware’us door in Thames Street.” 

“ Perhaps, as that is the case,” said Mr. Chester, 
“and as it has a stronger flavor of oil than I usually 
refresh my bedroom with, you will oblige me so far as to 
put it outside the door ? ” 

“ By all means, sir,” said Mr. Tappertit, suiting the 
action to the word. 

“ You’ll excuse my mentiorting it, I hope ? ” 

“ Don’t apologize, sir, I beg. And now, if you please, 
to business.” 

During the whole of this dialogue, Mr. Chester had 
suffered nothing but his smile of unvarying serenity and 
politeness to appear upon his face. Sim Tappertit, who 
had far too good an opinion of himself to suspect that 
anybody could be playing upon him, thought within him- 
self that this was something like the respect to which he 
was entitled, and drew a comparison from this courteous 
demeanor of a stranger, by no means favorable to the 
worthy locksmith. 

“ From what passes in our house,” said Mr. Tapper- 
tit, “ I am aware, sir, that your son keeps company with 


278 


BAKNABY RUDGE. 


a young lady against your inclinations. Sir, your son 
has not used me well.” 

“ Mr. Tappertit,” said the other, “ you grieve me be- 
yond description.” 

Thank you, sir,” replied the ’prentice. “ I’m glad 
to hear you say so. He’s very proud, sir, is your son ; 
very haughty.” 

“ I am afraid he is haughty,” said Mr. Chester. “ Do 
you know I was really afraid of that before ; gnd you 
confirm me?” 

“ To recount the menial ofl&ces I’ve had to do for your 
son, sir,” said Mr. Tappertit ; “ the chairs I’ve had to hand 
him, the coaches I’ve had to call for him, the numerous 
degrading duties, wholly unconnected with my indenters, 
that I’ve had to do for him, would fill a family Bible. 
Besides which, sir, he is but a young man himself, and I 
do not consider ‘ thank’ee Sim,’ a proper form of ad- 
dress on those occasions.” 

“ Mr. Tappertit, your wisdom is beyond your years. 
Pray go on.” 

“ I thank you for your good opinion, sir,” said Sim, 
much gratified, “ and will endeavor so to do. Now, sir, 
on this account (and perhaps for another reason or two 
which I needn’t go into) I am on your side. And what 
I tell you is this — that as long as our people go back- 
wards and forwards, to and fro, up and down, to that 
there jolly old Maypole, lettering, and messaging, and 
fetching and carrying, you couldn’t help your son keep- 
ing company with that young lady by deputy, — not if 
he was minded night and day by all the Horse Guards, 
and every man of ’em, in the very fullest uniform.” 

Mr. Tappertit stopped to take breath after this, and 
then started fresh again. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


279 


“ Now, sir, I am a-coming to the point. Yon will 
inquire of me, ‘how is this to be prevented?^ I’ll 
tell you how. If an honest, civil, smiling gentleman 
like you” — 

“ Mr. Tappertit — really ” 

“ No, no, I’m serious,” rejoined the ’prentice, “ I am, 
upon my soul. If an honest, civil, smiling gentleman 
like you, was to talk but ten minutes to our old woman 
— that’s Mrs. Varden — and flatter her up a bit, you’d 
gain her over forever. Then there’s this point got — that 
her daughter Dolly,” — here a flush came over Mr. Tap- 
pertit’s face — “ wouldn’t be allowed to be a go-between 
from that time forward ; and till that point’s got, there’s 
nothing ever will prevent her. Mind that.” 

“ Mr. Tappertit, your knowledge of human nature” — 

“ Wait a minute,” said Sim, folding his arms with a 
dreadful .calmness. “ Now, I come to the point. Sir, 
there is a villain at that Maypole, a monster in 
human shape, a vagabond of the deepest dye, that 
unless you get rid of, and have kidnapped and car- 
ried off at the very least — nothing less will do — 
will marry your son to that young woman, as cer- 
tainly and surely as if he was the Archbishop of 
Canterbury himself. He will, sirf for the hatred and 
malice that he bears to you ; let alone the pleasure of 
doing a bad action, which to him is its own reward. 
If you knew how this chap, this Joseph Willet — that’s 
his name — comes backwards and forwards to our 
house, libelling, and denouncing, and threatening you, 
and how I shudder when I hear him, you’d hate 
him worse than I do, — worse than I do, sir,” said 
Mr. Tappertit wildly, putting his hair up straighter, 
and making a crunching noise with his teeth ; “ if 
dch a thing is possible.” 


280 


BAKNABY BUDGE. 


“A little private vengeance in this, Mr. Tappertit?*' 

“ Private vengeance, sir, or public sentiment, or botl 
combined — destroy him,” said Mr. Tappertit. “ Miggs 
says so too. Miggs and me both say so. We can’* 
bear the plotting and undermining that takes place. Oui 
souls recoil from it. Barnaby Rudge and Mrs. Rudge 
are in it likewise ; but the villain, Joseph Willet, is 
the ringleader. Their plottings and schemes are known 
to me and Miggs. If you want information of ’em, ap- 
ply to us. Put Joseph Willet down, sir. Destroy him. 
Crush him. And be happy.” 

With these words, Mr. Tappertit, who seemed to ex- 
pect no reply, and to hold it as a necessary consequence 
of his eloquence that his hearer should be utterly 
stunned, dumfounded, and overwhelmed, folded his 
arms so that the palm of each hand rested on the 
opposite shoulder, and disappeared after the ^manner 
of those mysterious warners of whom he had read in 
cheap story-books. 

“ That fellow,” said Mr. Chester, relaxing his face 
when he was fairly gone, “ is good practice. I have 
some command of my features, beyond all doubt. 
He fully confirms what I suspected, though ; and 
blunt tools are sometimes found of use, where sharper 
instruments would fail. I fear I may be obliged to 
make great havoc among these worthy people. A 
troublesome necessity ! I quite feel for them.” 

With that he fell into a quiet slumber : — subsided 
into such a gentle, pleasant sleep, that it was quite 
infantine. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


281 


CHAPTER XXV. 

Leaving the favored, and well-received, and flattered 
of the world ; him of the world most worldly, who never 
compromised himself by an ungentlemanly action, and 
never was guilty of a manly on§ ; to lie smilingly asleep 
— for even sleep, working but little change in his dis- 
sembling face, became with him a piece of cold, conven- 
tional hypocrisy — we follow in the steps of two slow 
travellers on foot, making towards Chigwell. 

Barnaby and his mother. Grip in their company of 
course. 

The widow, to whom each painful mile seemed longer 
than the last, toiled wearily along ; while Barnaby, yield- 
ing to every inconstant impulse, fluttered here and there, 
now leaving her far behind, now lingering far behind 
himself, now darting into some by-lane or path and 
leaving her to pursue her way alone, until he stealth- 
ily emerged again and came upon her wnth a wild shout 
of merriment, as his w'ayward and capricious nature 
prompted. Now he would call to her from the top- 
most branch of some high tree by the roadside ; now 
using his tall staff as a leaping-pole, come flying over 
ditch or hedge or five-barred gate ; now run with sur- 
prising swiftness for a mile or more on the straight road, 
and halting, sport upon a patch of grass with Grip till 
she came up. These were his delights ; and when his 
patient mother heard his merry voice, or looked into 


282 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


his flushed and healthy 'face, she would not have abated 
them by one sad word or murmur, though each had been 
to her a source of suffering in the same degi’ee as it was 
to him of pleasure. 

It is something to look upon enjoyment, so that it be 
free and wild and in the face of nature, though it is but 
the enjoyment of an idiot. It is something to know that 
Heaven has left the capacity of gladness in such a crea- 
ture’s breast ; it is something to be assured that, however 
lightly men may crush that faculty in their fellows, the 
Great Creator of mankind imparts it even to his de- 
spised and slighted work. Who would not rather see 
a poor idiot happy in the sunlight,- than a wise man pin- 
ing in a darkened jail ! 

Ye men of gloom and austerity, who paint the face of 
Infinite Benevolence with an eternal frown ; read in the 
Everlasting Book, wide open to your view, the lesson it 
would teach. Its pictures are not in black and sombre 
hues, but bright and glowing tints; its music — save 
when ye drown it — is not in sighs and groans, but songs 
and cheerful sounds. Listen to the million voices in the 
summer air, and find one dismal as your own. Remem- 
ber, if ye can, the sense of hope and pleasure which 
every glad return of day awakens in the breast of all 
your kind who have not changed their nature ; and learn 
some wisdom even from the witless, when their hearts 
are lifted up they know not why, by all the mirth and 
happiness it brings. 

The widow’s breast was full of care, was laden heavily 
with secret dread and sorrow ; but her boy’s gayety of 
heart gladdened her, and beguiled the long journey. 
Sometimes he would bid her lean upon his arm, and 
would keep beside her steadily for a short distance ; but 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


283 


it was more his nature to be rambling to and fro, and 
she better liked to see him free and happy, even than 
to lave him near her, because she loved him better than 
herself. 

She had quitted the place to which they were travel- 
ling, directly after the event which had changed her 
whole existence ; and for two and twenty years had 
never had courage to revisit it. It was her native vil- 
lage. How many recollections crowded on her mind 
when it appeared in sight ! 

T wo-and-twenty-years. Her boy’s whole life and his- 
lory. The last time she looked back upon those roofs 
among the trees, she carried him in her arms, an infant. 
How often since that time had she sat beside him night 
and day, watching for the dawn of mind that never 
came ; how had she feared, and doubted, and yet hoped, 
long after conviction forced itself upon her ! The little 
stratagems she had devised to try him, the little tokens 
he had given in his childish way — not of dulness but 
of something infinitely worse, so ghastly and unchildlike 
in its cunning — came back as vividly as if but yester- 
day had intervened. The room in which they used to 
be ; the spot in which his cradle stood ; he old and elfin- 
like in face, but ever dear to her, gazing at her with a 
wild and vacant eye, and crooning some uncouth song as 
she sat by and rocked him ; every circumstance of his 
infancy came thronging back, and the most trivial, per- 
haps, the most distinctly. 

His older childhood, too ; the strange imaginings he 
had ; his terror of certain senseless things — familiar ob- 
jects he endowed wdth life ; the slow and gradual break- 
ing out of that one horror, in which, before his birth, his 
darkened intellect began ; how, in the' midst of all, she 


284 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


had found some hope and comfort in his being unlike 
another child, and had gone on almost believing in the 
slow development of his mind until he grew a man, and 
then his childhood was complete and lasting ; one after 
another, all these old thoughts sprung up within her, 
strong after their long slumber and bitterer than ever. 

She took his arm and they hurried through the vil- 
lage street. It was the same as it was wont to be in 
old times, yet different too, and wore another air. The 
change was in herself, not it ; but she never thought of 
that, and wondered at its alteration, and where it lay, 
and what it was. 

The people all knew Barnaby, and the children of the 
place came flocking round him — as she remembered to 
have done with their fathers and mothers, round some 
silly beggarman, when a child herself. None of them 
knew her ; they passed ..each well-remembered house, 
and yard, and homestead ; and striking into the fields, 
were soon alone again. 

The Warren was the end of their journey. Mr. Hare- 
dale was walking in the garden, and seeing them as they 
passed the iron gate, unlocked it, and bade them enter 
that way. 

At length you have mustered heart to visit the old 
place,” he said to the widow. “I am glad you have.” 

“ For the first time, and the last, sir,” she replied. 

“ The first for many years, but not the last ? ” 

‘‘ The very last.” 

“ You mean,” said Mr. Haredale, regarding her with 
Bome surprise, “ that having made this effort, you are 
resolved not to persevere and are determined to re- 
lapse ? This is unworthy of you. I have often told 
you, you should return here. You would be happier 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


285 


here than elsewhere, I know. As to Barnabj, it’s quite 
his home.” 

“ And Grip’s,” said Barnabj, holding the basket open. 
The raven hopped gravelj out, and perching on his 
shoulder and addressing himself to Mr. Haredale, cried 
— as a hint, perhaps, that some temperate refreshment 
would be acceptable — “ Polly put the ket-tle on, we’ll 
all have tea ! ” 

“ Hear me, Mary,” said Mr. Haredale kindly, as he 
motioned her to walk with him towards the house. 
“ Your life has been an example of patience and forti- 
tude, except in this one particular which has often given 
me great pain. It is enough to know that you ^were 
cruelly involved in the calamity which deprived me 
of an only brother, and Emma of her father, without 
being obliged to suppose (as I sometimes am) that 
you associate us with the author of our joint misfor- 
tunes.” 

“ Associate you with him, sir ! ” she cried. 

“ Indeed,” said Mr. Haredale, “ I think you do. I 
almost believe that because your husband was bound by 
so many ties to our relation, and died in his service and 
defence, you have come in some sort to connect us with 
his murder.” 

“ Alas ! ” she answered. “ You little know my heart, 
sir. You little know the truth ! ” 

“ It is natural you should do so ; it is very probable 
you may, without being conscious of it,” said Mr. Hare- 
dale, speaking more to himself than her. “ IVe are a 
fallen house. Money, dispensed with the most lavish 
hand, would be a poor recompense for sufferings like 
yours ; and thinly scattered by hands so pinched and tied 
as ours, it becomes a miserable mockery. I feel it so, 


286 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


God knows,” he added, hastily. “ Why should I wonder 
if she does ! ” 

“You do me wrong, dear sir, indeed,” she rejoined 
with great earnestness ; “ and yet when you come to 
hear what I desire your leave to say ” — 

“ I shall find my doubts confirmed ? ” he said, observ- 
ing that she faltered and became confused. “ Well 1 ” 
He quickened his pace for a few steps, but fell back 
again to hqr side, and said : — 

“And have you come all this way at last, solely to 
speak to me ? ” 

She answered, “ Yes.” 

“ A curse,” he muttered, “ upon the wretched state of 
us proud beggars, from whom the poor and rich are 
equally at a distance ; the one being forced to treat us 
with a show of cold respect ; the other condescending to 
us in their every deed and word, and keeping more aloof 
the nearer they approach us. — Why, if it were pain to 
you (as it must have been) to break for this slight pur- 
pose the chain of habit forged through two-and-twenty 
years, could you not let me know your wish, and beg me 
to come to you ? ” 

“ There was not time, sir,” she rejoined. “ I took my 
resolution but last night, and taking it, felt that I must 
not lose a day — a day ! an hour — in having speech 
with you.” 

They had by this time reached the house. Mr. Hare- 
dale paused for a moment, and looked at her as if sur 
prised by the energy of her manner. Observing, how- 
ever, that she took no heed of him, but glanced up, 
shuddering, a't the old walls with which such horrors 
were connected in her mind, he led her by a private 
Stair into his library, where Emma was seated in a 
window, reading. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


287 


The young lady, seeing who approached, hastily rose 
and laid aside her book, and with many kind words, and 
not without tears, gave her a warm and earnest welcome. 
But the widow shrunk from her embrace as though she 
feared her, and sunk down trembling on a chair. 

“ It is the return to this place after so long an 
Bence,” said Emma gently. Pray ring, dear' uncle 
— or stay — Barnaby will run himself and ask for 
wine ” — 

‘‘ Not for the world,” she cried. “ It would have 
another taste — I could not touch it. I want but a* 
minute’s rest. Nothing but that.” 

Miss Haredale stood beside her chair, regarding her 
with silent pity. She remained for a little time quite 
still ; then rose and turned to Mr. Haredale, who had 
sat down in his easy-chair, and was contemplating her 
with fixed attention. 

The tale connected with the mansion borne in mind, it 
seemed, as has been already said, the chosen theatre, for 
such a deed as it had known. The room in which this 
group were now assembled — hard by the very cham- 
ber where the act was done — dull, dark, and sombre ; 
heavy with worm-eaten books ; deadened and shut in by 
faded hangings, muffling every sound ; shadowed mourn- 
fully by trees whose rustling boughs gave ever and anon 
a spectral knocking at the glass ; wore, beyond all others 
in the house, a ghostly, gloomy air. Nor were the group 
assembled there, unfitting tenants of the spot. The 
widow, with her marked and startling face and downcast 
eyes ; Mr. Haredale stern and despondent ever ; his 
niece beside him, like, yet most unlike, the picture of her 
father, which gazed reproachfully down upon them from 
the blackened wall ; Barnaby, with his vacant look and 


288 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


restless eye ; were all in keeping with the place, and 
actors in tlie legend. Nay, the very raven, w^ho had 
hopped upon the table and with the air of some old 
necromancer appeared to be profoundly studying a great 
folio volume that lay open on a desk^ was strictly in 
unison with the rest, and looked like the embodied spirit 
of evil biding his time of mischief. 

“ I scarcely know,” said the widow, breaking silence, 
“how to begin. You will think my mind disordered.” 

“ The whole tenor of your quiet and reproachless 
life since you were last here,” returned Mr. Haredale, 
mildly, “ shall bear witness for you. Why do you fear 
to awaken such a suspicion ? You do not speak to 
strangers. You have not to claim our interest or con- 
sideration for the first time. Be more yourself. Take 
heart. Any advice or assistance that I can give you, 
you know is yours of right, and freely yours.” 

“ What if I came, sir,” she rejoined, “ I who have but 
one other friend on earth, to reject your aid from this 
moment, and to say that henceforth I launch myself upon 
the world, alone and unassisted, to sink or swim as 
Heaven may decree ! ” 

“You would have, if you came to me for such a 
purpose,” said Mr. Haredale calmly, “^some reason to 
assign for conduct so extraordinary, which — if one may 
entertain the possibility of anything so wild and strange 
— would have its weight, of course.” 

“ That, sir,” she answered, “ is the misery of my dis- 
tress. I can give no reason whatever. My own bare 
word is all that I can offer. It is my duty, my impera- 
tive and bounden duty. If I did not discharge it, J 
should be a base and guilty wretch. Having said that, 
my lips are sealed, and I can say no more.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


289 


As though she felt relieved at having said so much, 
and had nerved herself to the remainder of her task, 
she spoke from this time with a firmer voice and L eigh- 
tened courage. 

“ Heaven is my witness, as my owm heart is — and 
yours, dear young lady, will speak for me, I know — that 
I have lived, since that time we all have bitter reason 
to remember, in unchanging devotion, and gratitude to 
this family. Heaven is my witness that go where I 
may, I shall preserve those feelings unimpaired. And 
it is my witness, too, that they alone impel me to the 
course I must take, and from which nothing now shall 
turn me, as I hope for mercy.” 

“ These are strange riddles,” said Mr. Haredale. 

“In this world, sir,” she replied, “they may, per- 
haps, never be explained. In another, the Truth will 
be discovered in its own good time. And may that 
time,” she added in a low voice, “ be far distant ! ” 

“ Let me be sure,” said Mr. Haredale, “ that I under- 
stand you, for I am doubtful of my own senses. Do 
you mean that you are resolved voluntarily to deprive 
yourself of those means of support you have received 
from us so long — that you are determined to resign the 
annuity we settled on you twenty years ago — to leave 
house, and home, and goods, and begin life anew — and 
this, for some secret reason or monstrous fancy which 
is incapable of explanation, which only now exists, and 
has been dormant all this time ? In the name of God, 
under what delusion are you laboring ? ” 

“ As I am deeply thankful,” she made answer, “ for 
Ihe kindness of those, alive and dead, who have owned 
this house ; and as I would not have its roof fall down 
and crush me, or its very walls drip blood, my name 
19 


VOL. I 


290 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


being spoken in their hearing ; I never will again sub- 
sist upon their bounty, or let it help me to subsistence. 
You do not know,” she added suddenly, “ to what uses it 
may be applied ; into what hands it may pass. I do, and 
I renounce it.” 

“ Surely,” said Mr. Haredale, “ its uses rest with you.” 

^ They did. They rest with me no longer. It may 
be — it is — devoted to purposes that mock the dead 
in their graves. It never can prosper with me. It 
will bring some other heavy judgment on the head of 
my dear son, whose innocence will suffer for his mother’s 
guilt.” 

“ What words are these ! ” cried Mr. Haredale, re- 
garding her with wonder. “ Among what associates 
have you fallen ? Into what guilt have you ever been 
betrayed ? ” 

“ I am guilty, and yet innocent ; wrong, yet right ; 
good in intention, though constrained to shield and aid 
the bad. Ask me no more questions, sir ; but believe 
that I am rather to be pitied than condemned. I must 
leave my house to-morrow, for while I stay there, it is 
haunted. My future dwelling, if I am to live in peace, 
must be a secret. If my poor boy should ever stray this 
way, do not tempt him to disclose it or have him watched 
when he returns ; for if we are hunted, we must fly 
again. And now this load is off my mind, I beseech 
you — and you, dear Miss Haredale, too — to trust me 
if you can, and think of me kindly as you have been used 
to do. • If I die and cannot tell my secret even then (for 
that may come to pass), it will sit the lighter on my 
breast in that hour for this day’s work ; and on that day, 
and every day until it comes, I will pray for and thank 
you both, and trouble you no more.” 


BAKNABY BUDGE. 


291 


With that, she would have left them, but they detained 
her, and with many soothing words and kind entreaties 
besought her to consider what she did, and above all to 
repose more freely upon them, and say what weighed so 
sorely on her mind. Finding her deaf to their persua- 
sions, Mr. Haredale suggested, as a last resource, that 
she should confide in Emma, of whom, as a young person 
and one of her own sex, she might stand in less dread 
than of himself. From this proposal, however, she re- 
coiled with the same indescribable repugnance she had 
manifested when they met. The utmost that could be 
wrung from her was, a promise that she would receive 
Mr. Haredale at her own house next evening, and in the 
mean time reconsider her determination and their dis- 
suasions — though any change on her part, as she told 
them, was quite hopeless. This condition made at last, 
they reluctantly suffered her to depart, since she would 
neither eat nor drink within the house ; and she, and 
Barnaby, and Grip, accordingly went out as they had 
come, by the private stair and garden gate ; seeing and 
being seen of no one by the way. 

It was remarkable in the raven that during the whole 
interview he had kept his eye on his book with exactly 
the air of a very sly human rascal, who, under the mask of 
pretending to read hard, was listening to everything. He 
still appeared to have the conversation very strongly in • 
his mind, for although when they were alone again, he 
issued orders for the instant preparation of innumerable 
kettles for purposes of tea, he was thoughtful, and rather 
seemed to do so from an abstract sense of duty, than 
with any regard to making himself agreeable, or being 
what is commonly called good company. 

They were to return by the coach. As there was an 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


i92 


interval of full two hours before it started, and they 
needed rest and some refreshment, Barnaby begged 
hard for a visit to the Maypole. But his mother, who 
had no wish to be recognized by any of those who had 
known her long ago, and who feared besides that Mr. 
Haredale might, on second thoughts, despatch some mes- 
senger to that place of entertainment in quest of her, 
proposed to wait in the church-yard instead. As it was 
easy for Barnaby to buy and carry thither such humble 
viands as they required, he cheerfully assented, and in 
the church-yard they sat down to take their frugal dinner. 

Here again, the raven was in a highly reflective state ; 
walking up and down when he had dined, with an air of 
elderly complacency which was strongly suggestive of 
his having his hands under his coat-tails ; and appearing 
to read the tombstones with a very critical taste. Some- 
times, after a long inspection of an epitaph, lie would 
strop his beak upon the grave to which it referred, and 
cry in his hoarse tones, “ I’m a devil, I’m a devil. I’m a 
devil ! ” but whether he addressed his observations to 
any supposed person below, or merely threw them off 
as a general remark, is matter of uncertainty. 

It was a quiet pretty spot, but a sad one for Barna- 
by’s mother ; for Mr. Reuben Haredale lay there, and 
near the vault in which his ashes rested, was a stone to 
• the memory of her own husband, with a brief inscription 
recording how and when he had lost his life. She sa 
here, thoughtful and apart, until their time was out, and 
the distant horn told that the coach was coming. 

Barnaby, who had been sleeping on the grass, sprung 
up quickly at the sound ; and Grip, who appeared to un- 
derstand it equally well, walked into his basket straight- 
way, entreating society in general (as though he intended 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


293 


a kind of satire upon them in connection with church- 
yards) never to say die on any terms. They were soon 
on the coach-top and rolling along the road. 

It went round by the Maypole, and stopped at the 
door. Joe was from home, and Hugh came sluggishly 
out to hand up the parcel that it called for. There was 
no fear of old John coming out. They could see him 
from the coach-roof fast asleep in his cosey bar. It 
was a part of John’s character. He made a point of 
going to sleep at the coach’s time. He despised gadding 
about ; he looked upon coaches as things that ought to 
be indicted ; as disturbers of the peace of mankind ; as 
restless, bustling, busy, horn-blowing contrivances, quite 
beneath the dignity of men, and only suited to giddy girls 
that did nothing but chatter and go a-shopping. “We 
know nothing about coaches here, sir,” John would say, 
if any unlucky stranger made inquiry touching the offen- 
sive vehicles ; “ we don’t book for ’em ; we’d rather not ; 
they’re more trouble than they’re worth, with their noise 
and rattle. If you like to wait for ’em you can ; but we 
don’t know anything about ’em ; they may call and they 
may not — there’s a carrier — he was looked upon as 
quite good enough for us, when / was a boy.” 

She dropped her veil as Hugh climbed up, and while 
he hung behind and talked to Barnaby in whispers. But 
neither he nor any other person spoke to her, or noticed 
her, or had any curiosity about her ; and so, an alien, she 
visited and left the village where she had been born, 
and had lived a merry child, a comely girl, a happy wife 
^ where she had known all her enjoyment of life, and 
had entered on its hardest sorrows. 


294 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


CHAPTER XXVI. 

“And you’re not surprised to hear this, VardenF” 
said Mr. Haredale. “ Well ! You and she have always 
been the best friends, and you should understand her if 
anybody does.” 

“ I ask your pardon, sir,” rejoined the locksmith. “ I 
didn’t say I understood her. I wouldn’t have the pre- 
sumption to say that of any woman. It’s not so easily 
done. But I am not so much surprised, sir, as you ex- 
pected me to be, certainly.” 

“ May I ask why not, my good friend ? ” 

“ I have seen, sir,” returned the locksmith with evident 
reluctance, “ I have seen in connection with her, some- 
thing that has filled me with distrust and uneasiness. 
She has made bad friends, how, or when, I don’t know ; 
but that her house is a refuge for one robber and cut- 
throat at least, I am certain. There, sir ! Now it’s 
out.” 

Varden ! ” 

“ My own eyes, sir, are my witnesses, and for her sake 
I would be willingly half-blind, if I could but have the 
pleasure of mistrusting ’em. I have kept the secret till 
now, and it will go no further than yourself, I know ; but 
I tell you that with my own eyes — broad awake — I 
saw, in the passage of her house one evening after dark, 
the highwayman who robbed and wounded Mr. Edward 
Chester, and on the same night threatened me.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


295 


And you made no effort to detain him ? ” said Mr. 
Haredale quickly. 

“ Sir,” returned the locksmith, “ she herself prevented 
me — held me, with all her strength, and hung about me 
until he had got clear off.” And having gone so far, he 
related circumstantially all that had passed upon the night 
in question. 

This dialogue was held in a low tone in the locksmith’s 
little parlor, into which honest Gabriel had shown his 
visitor on his arrival. Mr. Haredale had called upon 
him to entreat his company to the widow’s, that he might 
have the assistance of his persuasion and influence ; and 
out of this circumstance the conversation had arisen. 

“ I forbore,” said Gabriel, “ from repeating one word 
of this to anybody, as it could do her no good and might 
do her great harm. I thought and hoped, to say the truth, 
that she would come to me, and talk to me about it, and tell 
me how it was ; but though I have purposely put my- 
self in her way more than once or twice, she has never 
touched upon the subject — except by a look. And in- 
deed,” said the good-natured locksmith, “ there was a 
good deal in the look, more than could have been put 
into a great many words. It said among other matters 
‘Don’t ask me anything’ so imploringly, that I didn’t ask 
her anything. You’ll think me an old fool I know, sir. 
If it’s any relief to call me one, pray do.” 

“ I am greatly disturbed by what you tell me,” said 
Mr. Haredale, after a silence. “ What meaning do you 
attach to it ? ” 

The locksmith shook his head, and looked doubtfully 
out of window at the failing light. 

“ She cannot have married again,” said Mr. Haredale- 

“ Not without our knowledge surely, sir.” 


296 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ She may have done so, in the fear that it would lead, 
if known, to some objection or estrangement. Suppose 
she married incautiously — it is not improbable, for her 
existence has been a lonely and monotonous one for 
many years — and the man turned out a ruffian, she 
would be anxious to screen him, and yet would revolt 
from his crimes. This might be. It bears strongly on 
the whole drift of her discourse yesterday, and would 
quite explain her conduct. Do you suppose Barnaby 
is privy to these circumstances ? ” 

“ Quite impossible to say, sir,” returned the locksmith, 
shaking his head again : “ and next to impossible to find 
out from him. If what you suppose is really the case, I 
tremble for the lad — a notable person, sir, to put to bad 
uses ” — 

“ It is not possible, Varden,” said Mr. Haredale, in a 
still lower tone of voice than he had spoken yet, “ that 
we have been blinded and deceived by this woman from 
the beginning? It is not possible that this connection 
was formed in her husband’s lifetime, and led to his and 
my brother’s ” 

“ Good God, sir,” cried Gabriel, interrupting him, 
“ don’t entertain such dark thoughts for a moment. 
'Five-and-twenty years ago, where was there a girl like 
her ? A gay, handsome, laughing, bright-eyed damsel I 
Think what she was, sir. It makes my heart ache now, 
even now, though I’m an old man, with a woman for a 
daughter, to think what she was and w’hat she is. We 
all change, but that’s with Time ; Time does his work 
honestly, and I don’t mind him. A fig for Time, sir. 
Use him well, and he’s a hearty fellow, and scorns to 
have you at a disadvantage. But care and suflTering 
(and those have changed her) are devils, sir — secret. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


207 


Btealthy, undermining devils — who tread down (he 
brightest flowers in Eden, and do more havoc in a 
month than Time does in a year. Picture to yourselt 
for one minute what Mary was before they went to work 
with her fresh heart and face — do her that justice — 
and say whether such a thing is possible.” 

“ You’re a good fellow, Varden,” said Mr. Haredale, 
“ and are quite right. I have brooded on that subject so 
long, that every breath of suspicion carries me back to 
it. You are quite right.” 

“ It isn’t, sir,” cried the locksmith with brightened 
eyes, and sturdy, honest voice ; “ it isn’t because I 
courted her before Rudge, and failed, that I say she 
was too good for him. She would have been as much 
too good for me. But she was too good for him ; he 
wasn’t free and frank enough for her. I don’t reproach 
his memory with it, poor fellow ; I only want to put her 
before you as she really was. For myself, I’ll keep her 
old picture in my mind ; and thinking of that, and what 
has altered her. I’ll stand her friend, and try to win her 
back to peace. And damme, sir,” cried Gabriel, with 
your pardon for the word, I’d do the same if she had 
married fifty highwaymen in a twelvemonth ; and think 
it in the Protestant Manual too, though Martha said it 
wasn’t, tooth and nail, till doomsday ! ” 

If the dark little parlor had been filled with a dense 
fog, which, clearing away in an instant, left it all ra* 
diance and brightness, it could not have been more sud- 
denly cheered than by this outbreak on the part of the 
hearty locksmith. In a voice nearly as full and round 
as his own, Mr. Haredale cried “ Well said ! ” and bade 
him come away without more parley. The locksmith 
complied right willingly ; and both getting into a hack- 


298 


13ARNABY RUDGE. 


ney-coacli which was waiting at the door, drove off 
straightway. 

They alighted at the street-corner, and dismissing 
their conveyance, walked to the house. To their first 
knock at the door there was no response. A second met 
with the like result. But in answer to the third, which 
was of a more vigorous kind, the parlor window-sash 
was gently raised, and a musical voice cried : — 

“ Haredale, my dear fellow, I am extremely glad to 
see you. How very much you have improved in your 
appearance since our last meeting ! I never saw you 
looking better. How do you do ? ” 

Mr. Haredale turned his eyes towards the casement 
whence the voice proceeded, though there was no need 
to do so, to recognize the speaker, and Mr. Chester 
waved his hand, and smiled a courteous welcome. 

“ The door will be opened immediately,” he said. 
“ There is nobody but a very dilapidated female to per- 
form such offices. You will excuse her infirmities ? If 
she were in a more elevated station of society, she 
would 'be gouty. Being but a hewer of wood and draw- 
er of water, she is rheumatic. My dear Haredale, 
these are natural class distinctions, depend upon it.” 

ISIr. Haredale, whose face resumed its lowering and 
distrustful look the moment he heard the voice, inclined 
his head stiffly, and turned his back upon the speaker. 

“ Not opened yet ! ” said Mr. Chester. “ Dear me ! 
I hope the aged soul has not caught her foot in some un- 
lucky cobweb by the way. She is there at last ! Come 
in, I beg ! ” 

Mr. Haredale entered, followed by the locksmith. 
Turning with a look of great astonishment to the old 
woman who had opened the door, he inquired for Mrs. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


29S 


Rudge — for Barnaby. They were both gone, she re- 
plied, wagging her ancient head, for good. There was a 
gentleman in the parlor, who perhaps could tell them 
more. That was all she knew. 

“ Pray, sir,” said Mr. Haredale, presenting himself 
before this new tenant, “where is the person whom I 
came here to see ? ” 

“ My dear friend,” he returned, “ I have not the least 
idea.” 

“Your trifling is ill-timed,” retorted the other in a 
suppressed tone and voice, “and its subject ill-chosen. 
Reserve it for those who are your friends, and do not 
expend it on me. I lay no claim to the distinction, and 
have the self-denial to reject it.” 

“ My dear, good sir,” said Mr. Chester, “ you are 
heated with walking. Sit down, I beg. Our friend 

IS — 

“ Is but a plain honest man,” returned Mr. Haredale, 
“ and quite unworthy of your notice.” 

“ Gabriel Varden by name, sir,” said the locksmith, 
bluntly. 

“ A worthy English yeoman ! ” said Mr. Chester. 
“ A most worthy yeoman, of whom I have frequently 
heard my son Ned — darling fellow — speak, and have 
often wished to see. Varden, my good friend, I am 
glad to know you. You wonder now,” he said, turning 
languidly to Mr. Haredale, “ to see me here. Now, I 
am sure you do.” 

Mr. Haredale glanced at him — not fondly or admir- 
ingly — smiled, and held his peace. 

“ The mystery is solved in a moment,” said Mr. Ches- 
ter ; “in a moment. Will you step aside with me one 
Instant. You remember our little compact in reference 


300 


BAKNABY RUDGE. 


to Ned, and your dear niece, Haredale ? You remem- 
ber the list of assistants in their innocent intrigue ? 
You remember these two people being among them ? 
My dear fellow, congratulate yourself, and me. I have 
bought them off.” 

“ You have done what ? ” said Mr. Haredale. 

“ Bought them off,” returned his smiling friend. ^ I 
have found it necessary to take some active steps tow- 
ards setting this boy and girl attachment quite at rest, 
and have begun by removing these two agents. You 
are surprised ? Who can withstand the influence of a 
little money. They wanted it, and have been bought 
off. We have nothing more to fear from them. They 
are gone.” 

“ Gone ! ” echoed Mr. Haredale. “ Where ? ” 

“ My dear fellow — and you must permit me to say 
again, that you never looked so young ; so positively 
boyish as you do to-night — the Lord knows where ; I 
believe Columbus himself wouldn’t find them. Between 
you and me they have their hidden reasons, but upon 
that point I have pledged myself to secrecy. She ap- 
pointed to see you here to-night I know, but found it 
inconvenient, and couldn’t wait. Here is the key of 
the door. I am afraid you’ll find it inconveniently 
large ; but as the tenement is yours, your good-nature 
will excuse that, Haredale, I am certain I ' 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


301 


CHAPTER XXVIL 

Mr. Haredale stood in the widow’s parlor with the 
d<jor-key in his hand, gazing by turns at Mr. Chester 
and at Gabriel Varden, and occasionally glancing down- 
ward at the key as in the hope that of its own accord it 
would unlock the mystery ; until Mr. Chester, putting 
on his hat and gloves, and sweetly inquiring whether 
they were walking in the same direction, recalled him to 
himself. 

“ No,” he said. “ Our roads diverge — widely, as you 
know. For the present, I shall remain here.” 

‘‘ You will be hipped, Haredale ; you will be miser- 
able, melancholy, utterly wretched,” returned the other. 
“ It’s a place of the very last description for a man of 
your temper. I know it will make you very miserable.” 

“ Let it,” said Mr. Haredale, sitting down ; “ and 
thrive upon the thought. Good-night ! ” 

Feigning to be wholly unconscious of the abrupt wave 
of the hand which rendered this farewell tantamount to 
a dismissal, Mr. Chester retorted with a bland and heart- 
felt benediction, and inquired of Gabriel in what direc- 
tion he was going. 

“ Yours, sir, would be too much honor for the like of 
me,” replied the locksmith, hesitating. 

“ I wish you to remain here a little while, Varden,” 
said Mr. Haredale, without looking towards them. “ I 
have a word or two to say to you.” 


302 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ 1 will not intrude upon your conference another mo- 
ment,” said Mr. Chester with inconceivable politeness. 
‘ May it be satisfactory to you both ! God bless you ! ” 
So saying, and bestowing upon the locksmith a most re- 
fulgent smile, he left them. 

“A deplorably constituted creature, that rugged person,” 
he said, as he walked along the street ; “ he is an atrocity 
that carries its own punishment along with it — a be,ar 
that gnaws himself. And here is one of the inestimable 
advantages of having a perfect command over one’s in- 
clinations. I have been tempted in these two short in- 
terviews, to draw upon that fellow fifty times. Five 
men in six would have yielded to the impulse. By sup- 
pressing mine, I wound him deeper and more keenly 
than if I were the best swordsman in all Europe, and 
he the worst. You are the wise man’s very last re- 
source,” he said, tapping the hilt of his weapon ; “ we 
can but appeal to you when all else is said and done. 
To come to you before, and thereby spare our adver- 
saries so much, is a barbarian mode of warfare, quite 
unworthy any man with the remotest pretensions to deli- 
cacy of feeling, or refinement.” 

He smiled so very pleasantly as he communed with 
himself after this manner, that a beggar was emboldened 
to follow him for alms, and to dog his footsteps for some 
distance. He was gratified by the circumstance, feeling 
it complimentary to his power of feature, and as a re- 
ward suffered the man to follow him until he called a 
chair, when he graciously dismissed him with a fervent 
blessing. 

“ Which is as easy as cursing,” he wisely added, as he 
took his seat, “ and more becoming to the face. — To 
Clerkenwell, my good creatures, if you please ! ” The 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


303 


chairmen were rendered quite vivacious by having such 
a courteous burden, and to Clerkenwell they went at a 
fair round trot. 

Alighting at a certain point he had indicated to them 
upon the road, and paying them something less than 
they had expected from a fare of such gentle speech, he 
turned into the street in which the locksmith dwelt, and 
presently stood beneath the shadow of the Golden Key. 
Mr. Tappertit, who was hard at work by lamp-light, in a 
comer of the workshop, remained unconscious of his 
presence until a hand upon his shoulder made him start 
and turn his head. 

“ Industry,” said Mr. Chester, “ is the soul of business, 
and the key-stone of prosperity. Mr. Tappertit, I shall 
expect you to invite me to dinner when you are Lord 
Mayor of London.” 

“ Sir,” returned the ’prentice, laying down his ham- 
mer, and rubbing his nose on the back of a very sooty 
hand, “ I scorn the Lord Mayor and everything that 
belongs to him. We must have another state of society, 
sir, before you catch me being Lord Mayor. How de 
do, sir ? ” 

“ The better, Mr. Tappertit, for looking into your in- 
genuous face once more. I hope you are well.” 

“ I am as well, sir,” said Sim, standing up to get 
nearer to his ear, and whispering hoarsely, “ as any man 
can be under the aggrawations to which I am exposed. 
My life’s a burden to me. If it wasn’t for wengeance, 
I’d play at pitch and toss with it on the losing hazard.” 

“ Is Mrs. Varden at home ? ” said Mr. Chester. 

“ Sir,” returned Sim, eying him over with a look of 
concentrated expression, — “ she is. Did you wish to 
see her?” 


804 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Mr. Chester nodded. 

“ Then come this way, sir,” said Sim, wiping his face 
^pon his apron. “ Follow me, sir. — Would you permit 
me to whisper in your ear, one half a second ? ” 

“ By all means.” 

Mr. Tappertit raised himself on tiptoe, applied his 
lips to Mr. Chester’s ear, drew back his head without 
saying anything, looked hard at him, applied them to his 
ear again, again drew back, and finally whispered — 
“ The name is Joseph Willet. Hush ! I say no 
more.” 

Having said that much, he beckoned the visitor with a 
mysterious aspect to follow him to the parlor-door, where 
he announced him in the voice of a gentleman-usher. 
“Mr. Chester.” 

“ And not Mr. Ed’dard, mind,” said Sim, looking into 
the door again, and adding this by way of postscript in 
his own person ; “ it’s his father.” 

“ But do not let his father,” said Mr. Chester, advan- 
cing hat in hand, as he observed the effect of this last ex- 
planatory announcement, “ do not let his father be any 
check or restraint on your domestic occupations. Miss 
Varden.” 

“ Oh ! Now ! There ! A’n’t I always a-saying it ! ” 
exclaimed Miggs, clapping her hands. “If he a’n’t 
been and took Missis for her own daughter. Well, she 
do look like it, that she do. Ony think of that, mim ! ” 

“Is it possible,” said Mr. Chester in his softest tones 
“ that this is Mrs. Varden 1 I am amazed. That is not 
your daughter, Mrs. Varden ? No, no. Your sister.” 

“ My daughter, indeed, sir,” returned Mrs. V. blush- 
ing with great juvenility. 

“ Ah, Mrs. Varden ! ” cried the visitor “ Ah, ma’am 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


305 


— humanity is indeed a happy lot, when we can repeat 
ourselves in others, and still be young as they. You 
must allow me to salute you — the custom of the coun- 
try, my dear madam — your daughter too.” 

Dolly showed some reluctance to perform this cere- 
mony, but was sharply reproved by Mrs. Varden, who 
insisted on her undergoing it that minute. For pride, 
she said with great severity, was one of the seven deadly 
sins, and humility and lowliness of heart were virtues. 
Wherefore she desired that Dolly would be kissed im- 
mediately, on pain of her just displeasure ; at the same 
time giving her to understand that whatever she saw her 
mother do, she might safely do herself, without being at 
the trouble of any reasoning or reflection on the subject 

— which, indeed, was offensive and undutiful, and in 
direct contravention of the church catechism. 

Thus admonished, Dolly complied, though by no 
means willingly ; for there was a broad, bold look of 
admiration in Mr. Chester’s face, refined and polished 
though it sought to be, which distresr ld her very much. 
As she stood with downcast eyes, not liking to look up 
and meet his, he gazed upon her with an approving air, 
and then turned to her mother. 

“ My friend Gabiiel (whose acquaintance I only made 
his very evening) should be a happy man, Mrs. Var- 
len.” r 

Ah ! ” sighed Mrs. V., shaking her head. ^ 

‘‘ Ah ! ” echoed Miggs. 

“ Is that the case ? ” said Mr. Chester, compassionately. 

* Dear me ! ” 

“ Master has no intentions, sir,” murmured Miggs as 
she sidled up to him, “ but to be as grateful as his natur’ 
will let him, for everythink he owns which it is in his 
VOL. I. 20 


30G 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


powers to appreciate. But we never, sir,” — said Miggs. 
looking sideways at Mrs. Varden, and interlarding her 
discourse with a sigh — “ we never know the full value 
of some wines and fig-trees till we lose ’em. So much 
the worse, sir, for them as has the slighting of ’em on 
their consciences when they’re gone to be in full blow 
elsewhere.” And Miss Miggs cast up her eyes to signify 
where that might be. 

As Mrs. Varden distinctly heard, and was intended to 
hear, all that Miggs said, and as these words appeared 
to convey in metaphorical terms a presage or foreboding 
that she would at some early period droop beneath her 
trials and take an easy flight towards the stars, she im- 
mediately began to languish, and taking a volume of the 
Manual from a neighboring table, leant her arm upon it 
as though she were Hope and that her Anchor. Mr. 
Chester perceiving this, and seeing how the volume was 
lettered on the back, took it gently from her hand, and 
turned the fluttering leaves. 

“My favorite book, dear madam. How often, how 
very often in his early life — before he can remember ” 
— (this- clause was strictly true) “ have I deduced little 
easy moral lessons from its pages, for my dear son Ned 
You know Ned ? ” 

Mrs. Varden had that honor, and a flne affable young 
gentleman he was. 

“ You’re a mother, Mrs. Varden,” said Mr. Chester 
taking a pinch of snuff, “ and you know what I, as a 
father, feel, when he is praised. He gives me some un- 
easiness — much uneasiness — he’s of a roving nature, 
ma’am — from flower to flower — from sweet to sweet — 
but his is the butterfly time of life, and we must not be 
hard upon such trifling.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


307 


He glanced at Dolly. She was attending evidently 
to what he said. Just what he desired ! 

“ The only thing I object to in this little trait of Ned’s, 
is,” said Mr. Chester, “ — and the mention of his name 
reminds me, by the way, that I am about to beg the 
favor of a minute’s talk with you alone — the only thing 
I object to in it, is, that it does partake of insincerity. 
Now, however I may attempt to disguise the fact from 
myself in my affection for Ned, still I always revert to 
this — that if we are not sincere, we are nothing. Noth- 
ing upon earth. Let us be sincere, my dear madam ” — 

— “ and Protestant,” murmured Mrs. Varden. 

— “ and Protestant above all things. Let us be sin- 
cere and Protestant, strictly moral, strictly just (though 
always with a leaning towards mercy), strictly honest, 
and strictly true, and we gain — it is a slight point, cer- 
tainly, but still it is something tangible ; we throw up a 
groundwork and foundation, so to speak, of goodness, on 
which we may afterwards erect some worthy superstruc- 
ture.” 

Now, to be sure, Mrs. Varden thought, here is a per- 
fect character. Here is a meek, righteous, thorough- 
going Christian, who, having mastered all these qualities, 
so difficult of attainment ; who, having dropped a pinch 
of salt on the tails of all the cardinal virtues, and caught 
them every one ; makes light of their possession, and 
pants for more morality. For the good woman never 
1 doubted (as many good men and women never do), that 
! this slighting kind of profession, this setting so little store 
I by great matters, this seeming to say “ I am not proud, 
I am what you hear, but I consider myself no better 
than other people ; let us change the* subject, pray ” — 
v\’as perfectly genuine and true. He so contrived it, and 


308 


BAKNABY RUDGE. 


said it in that way that it appeared to have been forced 
from him, and its effect was marvellous. 

Aware of the impression he had made — few men 
were quicker than he at such discoveries — Mr. Chester 
followed up the blow by propounding certain virtuous 
maxims, somewhat vague and general in their nature, 
doubtless, and occasionally partaking of the character of 
truisms, worn a little out at elbow, but delivered in so 
charming a voice and with such uncommon serenity and 
peace of mind, that they answered as well as the best. 
Nor is this to be wondered at ; for as hollow vessels 
produce a far more musical sound in falling than those 
which are substantial, so it will oftentimes be found that 
sentiments which have nothing in them make the loudest 
ringing in the world, and are the most relished. 

Mr. Chester, with the volume gently extended in one 
hand, and with the other planted lightly on his breast, 
talked to them in the most delicious manner possible ; 
and quite enchanted all his hearers, notwithstanding their 
conflicting interests and thoughts. Even Dolly, who, be- 
twixt his keen regards- and her eying over by Mr. Tap- 
pertit, was put quite out of countenance, could not help 
owning within herself that he was the sweetest-spoken 
gentleman she had ever seen. Even Miss Miggs, who 
was divided between admij-ation of Mr. Chester and a 
mortal jealousy of her young mistress, had sufficient lei- 
sure to be propitiated. Even Mr. Tappertit, though 
occupied as we have seen in gazing at his heart’s delight, 
could not wholly divert his thoughts from the voice of 
the other charmer. Mrs. Varden, to her own private 
thinking, had never been so improved in all her life: 
and when Mr. Chester, rising and craving permission to 
speak with her apart, took her by the hand and led her 


BARNA8Y RUDGE. 


309 . 


at arm’s length up-stairs to the best sitting-room, she 
almost deemed him something more than human. 

“ Dear madam,” he said, pressing her hand delicately 
to his lips ; “ be seated.” 

Mrs. Varden called up quite a courtly air, and became 
seated. 

“ You guess my object ? ” said Mr. Chester, drawing a 
chair towards her. “ You divine my purpose ? I am an 
affectionate parent, my dear Mrs. Varden.” 

“ That I am sure you are, sir,” said Mrs. V. 

“ Thank you,” returned Mr. Chester, tapping his snuff- 
box lid. “ Heavy moral responsibilities rest with parents, 
Mrs. Varden.” 

Mrs. Varden slightly raised her hands, shook her head, 
and looked at the ground as though she saw straight 
through the globe, out at the other end, and into the 
immensity of space beyond. 

“ I may confide in you,” said Mr. Chester, “ without 
reserve. I love my son, ma’am, dearly ; and loving him 
as I do, I would save him from working certain misery. 
You know of his attachment to Miss Haredale. You 
have abetted him in it, and very kind of you it was 
to do so. I am deeply obliged to you — most deeply 
obliged to you — for your interest in his behalf ; but, 
my dear ma’am, it is a mistaken one, I do assure 
you.” 

Mrs. Varden stammered that she was sorry — 

“ Sorry, my dear ma’am,” he interposed. “ Never be 
sorry for what is so very amiable, so very good in inten 
tion, so perfectly like yourself. But there are grave and* 
weighty reasons, pressing family considerations, and apart 
even from these, points of religious difference, which in- 
cerpose themselves, and render their union impossible ; 


310 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


utterly im-possible. I should have mentioned these cir- 
cumstances to your husband ; but he has — you will ex- 
cuse my saying this -so freely — he has your quick- 
ness of apprehension or depth of moral sense. What an 
extremely airy house this is, and how beautifully kept ! 
For one like myself — a widower so long — these tokens 
of female care and superintendence have inexpressible 
charms.” 

Mrs. Varden began to think (she scarcely knew why) 
that the young Mr. Chester must be in the wrong, and 
the old Mr. Chester must be in the right. 

“ My son Ned,” resumed her tempter with his most 
winning air, “ has had, I am told, your lovely daughters 
aid, and your open-hearted husband’s.” 

— “Much more than mine, sir,” said Mrs. Varden; 
'“a great deal more. I have often had my doubts. It’s 
a” — 

“ A bad example,” suggested Mr. Chester. “ It is. No 
doubt it is. Your daughter is at that age when to set 
before her an encouragement for young persons to rebel 
against their parents on this most important point, is par- 
ticularly injudicious. You are quite right. I ought to 
have thought of that myself, but it escaped me, I confess 
— so far superior are your sex to ours, dear madam, in 
point of penetration and sagacity.” 

Mrs. Varden looked as wise as if she had really said 
omething to deserve this compliment — firmly believed 
<he had, in short — and her faith in her own shrewdness 
increased considerably. 

“ My dear ma’am,” said Mr. Chester, “ you embolden 
me to be plain with you. My son and I are at variance 
on this point. The young lady and her natural guar- 
'dian differ upon it, also. And the closing point is, that 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


311 


my son is bound, by his duty to me, by his honor, by 
every solemn tie and obligation, to marry some one else.” 

“ Engaged to marry another lady ! ” quoth Mrs, Var- 
den, holding up her hands. 

“ My dear madam, brought up, educated, and trained, 
expressly for that purpose. Expressly for that pur- 
pose. — Miss Haredale, I am told, is a very charming 
creature*” 

I am her foster-mother, and should know — the best 
young lady in the world,” said Mrs. Varden. 

I have not the smallest doubt of it. I am sure she 
is. And you, who have stood in that tender relation 
towards her, are bound to consult her happiness. Now, 
can I — as I have said to Haredale, who quite agrees — 
can I possibly stand by, and suffer her to throw herself 
away (although she is of a catholic family), upon a 
young fellow who, as yet, has no heart at all ? It is 
no imputation upon him to say he has not, because 
young men who have plunged deeply into the frivoli- 
ties and conventionalities of society, very seldom have. 
Their hearts never grow, my dear ma’am, till after thirty. 
I don’t believe, no, I do not believe, that I had any heart 
myself when I was Ned’s age.” 

“ Oh, sir,” said Mrs. Varden, “ I think you must have 
had. It’s impossible that you, who have so much now, 
can ever have been without any.” 

“ I hope,” he answered, shrugging his shoulders meek- 
ly, “ I have a little ; I hope, a very little — Heaven 
knows ! But to return to Ned ; I have no doubt you 
thought, and therefore interfered benevolently in his 
behalf, that I objected to Miss Haredale. How very 
natural ! My dear madam, I object to him — to him 
— emphatically to Ned himself.” 


312 


BARNABY EUDGE. 


Mrs. Varden was perfectly aghast at the disclosure. 

“ He has, if he honorably fulfils this solemn obligation 
of which I have told you — and he must be honorable, 
dear Mrs. Varden, or he is no son of mine — a fortune 
within his reach. He is of most expensive, ruinously ex- 
pensive habits ; and i£ in a moment of caprice and wil- 
fulness, he were to marry this young lady, and so de- 
prive himself of the means of gratifying the tastes to 
which he has been so long accustomed, he would — my 
dear madam, he would break the gentle creature’s heart. 
Mrs. Varden, my good lady, my dear soul, I put it to you 
— is such a sacrifice to be endured ? Is the female heart 
a thing to be trifled with in this way ? Ask your own, 
my dear madam. Ask your own, I beseech you.” 

“ Truly,” thought Mrs. Varden, “ this gentleman is a 
saint. But,” she added aloud, and not unnaturally, “ if 
you take Miss Emma’s lover away, sir, what becomes of 
the poor thing’s heart, then ? ” 

“ The very point,” said Mr. Chester, not at all abashed, 
“ to which I wished to lead you. A marriage with my 
son, whom I should be compelled to disown, w'ould be 
followed by years of misery ; they would be separated, 
my dear madam, in a twelvemonth. To break off this 
attachment, which is more fancied than real, as you and 
I know very well, will cost the dear girl but a few tears, 
and she is happy again. Take the case of your own 
daughter, the young lady down-stairs, who is your breath- 
ing image ” — Mrs. Varden coughed and simpered — 
“ there is a young man, (I am sorry to say, a dissolute 
fellow, of very indifferent character,) of whom I have 
heard Ned speak — Bullet was it — Pullet — Mullet ” — 

“ There is a young man of the name of Joseph Wil- 
let, sir,” said Mrs. Varden, folding her hands loftily. 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


313 


“ Tliat’s he,” cried Mr. Chester. “ Suppose this Jo- 
seph Willet now, were to aspire to the affections of your 
charming daughter, and were to engage them.” 

“ It would be like his impudence,” interposed Mrs. 
Varden, bridling, “ to dare to think of such a thing ! ” 
“ My dear madam, that’s the whole case. I know it 
would be like his impudence. It is like Ned’s impu- 
dence to do as he has done ; but you would not on that 
account, or because of a few tears from your beautiful 
daughter, refrain from checking their inclinations in their 
birth. I meant to have reasoned thus with your husband 
when I saw him at Mrs. Rudge’s this evening ” — 

“ My husband,” said Mrs. Varden, interposing with 
emotion, “ would be a great deal better at home than go- 
ing to Mrs. Rudge’s so often. I don’t know what he 
does there. I don’t see what occasion he has to busy 
himself in her affairs at all, sir.” 

“ If I don’t appear to express my concurrence in those 
last sentiments of yours,” returned Mr. Chester, “ quite 
so strongly as you might desire, it is because his being 
there, my dear madam, and not proving conversational, 
led me hither,' and procured me the happiness of this 
interview with one, in whom the whole management, 
conduct, and prosperity of her family are centred, I 
perceive.” 

With that he took Mrs. Varden’s hand again, and hav- 
ing pressed it to his lips with the high-flown gallantry of 
the day — a little burlesqued to render it the more strik 
ing in the good lady’s unaccustomed eyes — proceeded in 
the same strain of mingled sophistry, cajolery, and flat- 
tery to entreat that her utmost influence might be ex- 
erted to restrain her husband and daughter from any 
further promotion of Edward’s suit to Miss Haredale, 


314 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


and from aiding or abetting either party in any way. 
Mrs. Varden was but a woman, and had her share of van- 
ity, obstinacy, and love of power. She entered into a secret 
treaty of alliance, offensive and defensive, with her in- 
sinuating visitor ; and really did believe, as many others 
would have done who saw and heard him, that in so do- 
ng she furthered the ends of truth, justice, and morality, 
in a very uncommon degree. 

Overjoyed by the success of his negotiation, and 
mightily amused within himself, Mr. Chester conducted 
her down-stairs in the same state as before ; and having 
repeated the previous ceremony of salutation, which also 
as before comprehended Dolly, took his leave ; first com- 
pleting the conquest of Miss Miggs’s heart, by inquiring 
if “ this young lady ” would light him to the door. 

“ Oh, mim,” said Miggs, returning with the candle 
“ Oh gracious me, mim, there’s a gentleman ! Was 
there ever such an angel to talk as he is — and such 
a sweet-looking man ! So upright and noble, that he 
seems to despise the very ground he walks on ; and yet 
so mild and condescending, that he seems to say ‘ but I 
will take notice on it too.’ And to think of his taking 
you for Miss Dolly, and Miss Dolly for your sister — 
Oh, my goodness me, if I was master wouldn’t I be jeal- 
ous of him ! ” 

Mrs. Varden reproved her handmaid for this vain- 
speaking ; but very gently and mildly — quite smilingly 
indeed — remarking that she was a foolish, giddy, light- 
headed girl, whose spirits carried her beyond all bounds, 
and who didn’t mean half she said, or she would be quite 
angry with her. 

‘Tor my part,” said Dolly, in a thoughtful manntk, 
“ I half believe Mr. Chester is something like Miggs in 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


315 


that respect. For all his politeness and pleasant speak- 
ing, I am pretty sure he was making game of us, more 
than once.” 

“ If you venture ta say such a thing again, and to 
speak ill of people behind their backs in my presence, 
Miss,” said Mrs. Varden, “ I shall insist upon your tak- 
ing a candle and going to bed directly. How dare you, 
Dolly ? I’m astonished at you. The rudeness of your 
whole behavior this evening has been disgraceful. Did 
anybody ever hear,” cried the enraged matron bursting 
into tears, “ of a daughter telling her own mother she 
has been made game of ! ” 

Wliat a very uncertain temper Mrs. Varden’s was ! 


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BARNABY RUDGE 


A TALE OF THE RIOTS OF ^EIGHTY. 


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11,' CfOJr’^: 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


CHAPTER XXVIII. 

Repairing to a noted coffee-house in Covent Garden 
when he left the locksmith^s, Mr. Chester sat long over 
a late dinner, entertaining himself exceedingly with the 
whimsical recollection of his recent proceedings, and con- 
gratulating himself very much on his great cleverness. 
Influenced by these thoughts, his face wore an expres- 
sion so benign and tranquil, that the waiter in immediate 
attendance upon him felt he could almost have died in 
his defence, and settled in his own mind (until the re- 
ceipt of the bill, and a very small fee for very great 
trouble, disabused it of the idea) that such an apostolic 
customer was worth half a dozen of the ordinary run of 
visitors, at least. 

A visit to- the gaming-table — not as a heated, anxious 
venturer, but one whom it was quite a treat to see stak- 
ing his two or three pieces in deference to the follies of 
society, and smiling with equal benevolence on winners 
and losers — made it late before he reached home. It 
was his custom to bid his servant go to bed at his own 
time unless he had orders to the contrary, and to leave 
a candle on the common stair. There was a lamp on 
the landing by which he could always light it when 


6 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


he came home late, and having a key of the door about 
him he could enter and go to bed at his pleasure. 

He opened the glass of the dull lamp, whose wick, 
burnt up and swollen like a drunkard’s nose, came fly- 
ing oflf in little carbuncles at the candle’s touch, and 
scattering hot sparks about rendered it matter of some 
diflSculty to kindle the lazy taper ; when a noise, as of 
a man snoring deeply some steps higher up, caused him 
to pause and listen. It was the heavy breathing of a 
sleeper, close at hand. Some fellow had lain down on 
the open staircase, and was slumbering soundly. Hav- 
ing lighted the candle at length and opened his own 
door, he softly ascended, holding the taper high above 
his head, and peering cautiously about ; curious to see 
what kind of man had chosen so comfortless a shelter 
for his lodging. 

With his head upon the landing and his great limbs 
flung over half a dozen stairs, as carelessly as though 
he were a dead man whom drunken bearers had thrown 
down by chance, there lay Hugh, face uppermost, his 
long hair drooping like some wild weed upon his wooden 
pillow, and his huge chest heaving with the sounds which 
so unwontedly disturbed the place and hour. He who 
came upon him so unexpectedly was about to break his 
rest by thrusting him with his foot, when, glancing at 
his upturned face, he arrestpd himself in the very ac- 
tion, and stooping down and shading the candle with 
his hand, examined his features closely. Close as his 
first inspection was, it did not suffice, for he passed 
the light, still carefully shaded as before, across and 
across his face, and yet observed him with a searching 
eye. 

While he was thus engaged, the sleeper, without any 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


7 


starting or turning round, awoke. There was a kind of 
fascination in meeting his steady gaze so suddenly, which 
took from the other the presence of mind to withdraw his 
eyes, and forced him, as it were, to meet his look. So 
they remained staring at each other, until Mr. Chester 
at last broke silence, and asked him in a low voice, why 
ho lay sleeping there. 

“ I thought,” said Hugh, struggling into a sitting pos- 
ture and gazing at him intently, still, “ that you were a 
part of my dream. It was a curious one. I hope it 
may never come true, master.” 

“ What' makes you shiver ? ” 

“ The — the cold, I suppose,” he growled as he 
shook himself, and rose. “ I hardly know where I am 
yet.” 

“ Do you know me ? ” said Mr. Chester. 

“ Ay. I know you,” he answered. “ I was dreaming 
of you — we’re not where I thought we were. That’s a 
comfort.” 

He looked round him as he spoke, and in particular 
looked above his head, as though he half expected to 
be standing under some object which had had exist- 
ence in his dream. Then he rubbed his eyes and shook 
himself again, and followed his conductor into his own 
rooms. 

Mr. Chester lighted the candles which stood upon his 
dressing-table, and wheeling an easy-chair towards the 
fire, which was yet burning, stirred up a cheerful blaze, 
sat down before it, and bade his uncouth visitor “ Come 
here,” and draw his boots off. 

“ You have been drinking again, my fine fellow,” he 
said as Hugh went down on one knee, and did as he was 
told. 


8 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ As I’m alive, master, I’ve walked the twelve long 
miles, and waited here I don’t know how long, and 
had no drink between my lips since dinner-time at 
noon.” 

“ And can you do nothing better, my pleasant friend, 
than fall asleep, and shake the very building with your 
snores ? ” said Mr. Chester. “ Can’t you dream in your 
straw at home, dull dog as you are, that you need come 
here to do it ? — Reach me those slippers, and tread 
softly.” 

Hugh obeyed in silence. 

“ And harkee, my dear young gentleman,” said Mr. 
Chester, as he put them on, “ the next time you dream, 
don’t let it be of me, but of some dog or horse with 
whom you are better acquainted. Fill the glass once 
— you’ll find it and the bottle in the same place — and 
empty it to keep yourself awake.” 

Hugh obeyed again — even more zealously — and 
having done so, presented himself before his patron. 

“ Now,” said Mr. Chester, “ what do you want with 
me ?” 

“There was news to-day,” returned Hugh. “Your 
son was at our house — came down on horseback. He 
tried to see the young woman, but couldn’t get sight of 
her. He left some letter or some message which our 
Joe had charge of, but he and the old one quarrelled 
about it when your son had gone, and the old one 
wouldn’t let it be delivered. He says (that’s the old 
one does) that none of his people shall interfere and 
get him into trouble. He’s a landlord he says, and 
lives on everybody’s custom.” 

“ He is a jewel,” smiled Mr. Chester, “ and the better 
for being a dull one. — Well ? ” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


9 


“ Varden’s daughter — that’s the girl I kissed” — 

— “and stole the bracelet from upon the king’s high* 
way,” said Mr. Chester, composedly. “ Yes ; what of 
her ? ” 

“ She wrote a note at our house to the young w'oman, 
aying she lost the letter I brought to you, and you 
unit. Our Joe was to carry it, but the old one kept 
him at home all next day, on purpose that he shouldn’t. 
Next morning he gave it to me to take ; and here it 
is.” 

“ You didn’t deliver it then, my good friend ? ” said 
Mr. Chester, twdrling Dolly’s note between his finger 
and thumb, and feigning to be surprised. 

“ I supposed you’d want to have it,” retorted Hugh. 
“ Burn one, burn all, I thought.” 

“ My devil-may-care acquaintance,” said Mr. Chester 
— “ really if you do not draw some nicer distinctions, 
your career will be cut short with most surprising sud- 
denness. Don’t you know that the letter you brought 
to me, w'as directed to my son who resides in this very 
place ? And can you descry no difference between his 
letters and those addressed to other people ? ” 

“ If you don’t want it,” said Hugh, disconcerted by 
this reproof, for he had expected high praise, “ give it 
me back, and I’ll deliver it. I don’t know how to please 
you, master.” 

“ I shall deliver it,” returned his patron, putting it 
iway after a moment’s consideration, “ myself. Does 
the young lady walk out, on fine mornings ? ” 

“ Mostly — about noon is her usual time.” 

“ Alone ? ” 

“ Yes, alone.” 

“ Where ? ” 


10 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ In the grounds before the* house. — Them that the 
footpath crosses.” 

“ If the weather should be fine, I may throw myself in 
her way to-morrow, perhaps,” said Mr. Chester, as cooll}^ 
as if she were one of his ordinary acquaintance. “ Mr. 
Hugh, if I should ride up to the Maypole door, you will 
do me the favor only to have seen me once. You must 
suppress your gratitude, and endeavor to forget my for- 
bearance in the matter of the bracelet. It is natural it 
should break out, and it does you honor ; but when other 
folks are by, you must, for your own sake and safety, be 
as like your usual self as though you owed me no obliga- 
tion whatever, and had never stood within these walls. 
You comprehend me?” 

Hugh understood him perfectly. After a pause he 
muttered that he hoped his patron would involve him in 
no trouble about this last letter ; for he had kept it back 
solely with the view of pleasing him. He was continu- 
ing in this strain, when Mr. Chester with a most benef- 
icent and patronizing air cut him short by saying: — 

“ My good fellow, you have my promise, my word, 
my sealed bond (for a verbal pledge with me is quite 
as good), that I will always protect you so long as you 
deserve it. Now, do set your mind at rest. Keep it at 
ease, I beg of you. When a man puts himself in my 
power so thoroughly as you have done, I really feel as 
though he had a kind of claim upon me. I am more 
disposed to mercy and forbearance under such circum- 
stances than I can tell you, Hugh. Do look upon me as 
your protector, and rest assured, I entreat you, that on 
the subject of that indiscretion, you may preserve, as 
long as you and I are friends, the lightest heart that 
ever beat within a human breast. Fill that glass once 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


11 


more to cheer you on your road homewards — I am 
really quite ashamed to think how far you have to go — 
and then God bless you for the night.” 

“They think,” said Hugh, when he had tossed the 
liquor down, “ that I am sleeping soundly in the stable. 
Ha, ha, ha ! The stable-door is shut, but the steed’s gone, 
master.” 

“ You are a most convivial fellow,” returned his 
fi’iend, “and I love your humor of all things. Good- 
night ! Take the greatest possible care of yourself, for 
my sake ! ” 

It was remarkable that during the whole interview, 
each had endeavored to catch stolen glances of the 
other^s face, and had never looked full at it. They 
interchanged one brief and hasty glance as Hugh went 
out, averted their eyes directly, and so separated. Hugh 
closed the double doors behind him, carefully and without 
noise ; and Mr. Chester remained in his easy-chair, with 
his gaze intently fixed upon the fire. 

“ Well! ” he said, after meditating for a long time — 
and said with a deep sigh and an uneasy shifting of his 
attitude, as though he dismissed some other subject from 
his thoughts, and returned to that which had held posses- 
sion of them ^all the day — “ the plot thickens ; I have 
thrown the shell ; it will explode, I think, in eight-and- 
forty hours, and should scatter these, good folks amaz- 
'ngly. We shall see I ” 

. He went to bed and fell asleep, but had not slept long 
when he started up and thought that Hugh was at the 
outer door, calling in a strange voice, very different from 
bis own, to be admitted. The delusion was so strong 
upon him, and was so full of that vague terror of the 
night in which such visions have their being, that he 


12 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


rose, and taking his sheathed sword in his hand, opened 
the door, and looked out upon the staircase, and towards 
the spot where Hugh had lain asleep ; and even spoke 
to him by name. But all was dark and quiet, and creep- 
ing back to bed again, he fell, after an hour’s uneasy 
watching, into a second sleep, and woke no more tiU 
morning. 


BAfiNABY BUDGE. 


15 


CHAPTER XXIX. 

•The thoughts of worldly men are forever regulated 
by a moral law of gravitation, which, like the physical 
one, holds them down to earth. The bright glory of day, 
and the silent wonders of a starlit night, appeal to their 
minds in vain. There are no signs in the sun, or in the 
moon, or in the stars, for their reading. They are like 
some wise men, who, learning to know each planet by its 
Latin name, have quite forgotten such small heavenly 
constellations as Charity, Forbearance, Universal Love, 
and Mercy, although they shine by night and day so 
brightly that the blind may see them ; and who, looking 
upward at the spangled sky, see nothing there but the 
reflection of their own great wisdom and book-learn- 
ing. 

It is curious to imagine these people of the world, 
busy in tljpught, turning their eyes toward the countless 
spheres that shine above us, and making them reflect the 
only images their minds contain. The man who lives 
but in the breath of princes, has nothing in his sight but 
stars for courtiers’ breasts. The envious man beholds 
his neighbors’ honors even in the sky ; to the money- 
hoarder, and the mass of worldly folk, the whole great 
universe above glitters with sterling coin — fresh from 
the mint — stamped with the sovereign’s head coming 
always between them and heaven, turn where they may. 
So do the shadows of our own desires stand between 


14 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


US and our better angels, and thus their brightness is 
eclipsed. 

Everything was fresh and gay, as though the world 
were but that morning made, when Mr. Chester rode at 
a tranquil pace along the Forest road. Though early in 
the season, it was warm and genial weather ; the trees 
were budding into leaf, the hedges and the grass were 
green, the air was musical with songs of birds, and high 
above them all the lark poured out her richest melody. 
In shady spots, the morning dew sparkled on each young 
leaf and blade of grass ; and where the sun was shining, 
some diamond drops yet glistened brightly, as in unwilh 
ingness to leave so fair a world, and have such brief 
existence. Even the light wind, whose rustling was as 
gentle to the ear as softly falling water, had its hope and 
promise ; and, leaving a pleasant fragrance in its track 
as it went fluttering by, whispered of its intercourse with 
Summer, and of his happy coming. 

The solitary rider went glancing on among the trees, 
from sunlight into shade and back again, at the same 
even pace — looking about him, certainly, from time to 
time, but with no greater thought of the day or the 
scene through which he moved, than that hg was for- 
tunate (being choicely dressed) to have such favorable 
weather. He smiled very complacently at such times, 
but rather as if he were satisfied with himself than with 
anything else ; and so went riding on, upon his chestnut 
cob, as pleasant to look upon as his own horse, and prob- 
ably far less sensitive to the many cheerful influences by 
which he was surrounded. 

In course of time, the Maypole’s massive chimneyvS 
lose upon his view : but he quickened not his pace one 
jot, and with the same cool gravity rode up to the tavern 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


15 


porch. John 'VYillet, who was toasting his red face be* 
fore a great fire in the bar, and who, with surpassing 
foresight and quickness of apprehension, had been think- 
ing, as he looked at the blue sky, that if that state of 
things lasted much longer, it might ultimately become 
necessary to leave off fires and throw the windows open, 
issued forth to hold his stirrup ; calling lustily for Hugh. 

“ Oh, you’re here, are you, sir ? ” said John rather 
surprised by the quickness with which he appeared. 
“Take this here valuable animal into the stable, and 
have more than particular care of him if you want to 
keep your place. A mortal lazy fellow, sir ; he needs a 
deal of looking after.” 

“ But you have a son,” returned Mr. Chester, giving 
his bridle to Hugh as he dismounted, and acknowledging 
his salute by a careless motion of his hand towards his 
hat. “ Why don’t you make him useful ? ” 

“ Why, the truth is, sir,” replied John with great im- 
portance, “ that my son — what, you’re a-listening are 
you, villain ? ” 

“ Who’s listening ? ” returned • Hugh angrily. “ A 
treat, indeed, to hear you speak ! Would you have me 
take him in till he’s cool ? ” 

“ Walk him up and down farther off then, sir,” cried 
old John, “ and when you see me and a noble gentleman 
entertaining ourselves with talk, keep your distance. If 
you don’t know your distance, sir,” added Mr. Willet, 
after an enormously long pause, during which he fixed 
his great dull eyes on Hugh, and waited with exemplary 
patience for any little property in the way of ideas that 
might be coming to him, “ we’ll find a way to teach you, 
pretty soon.” 

Hugh shrugged his shoulders scornfully, and in his 


16 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


reckless swaggering way, crossed to the other side of 
the little green, and there, with the bridle slung loosely 
over his shoulder, led the horse to and fro, glancing at 
his master every now and then fi’om under his bushy 
eyebrows, with as sinister an aspect as one would desire 
to see. 

Mr. Chester, who, without appearing to do so, had 
eyed him attentively during this brief dispute, stepped 
into the porch, and turning abruptly to Mr. Willet, 
said, — 

You keep strange servants, John.” 

“ Strange enough to look at, sir, certainly,” answered 
the host ; “ but out of doors ; for horses, dogs, and the 
like of that ; there a’n’t a better man in England than is 
that Maypole Hugh yonder. He a’n’t fit for in-doors,” 
added Mr. Willet, with the confidential air of a man 
who felt his own superior nature, “ I do that ; but if that 
chap had only a little imagination, sir ” — 

“ He’s an active fellow now, I dare swear,” said Mr. 
Chester, in a musing tone, which seemed to suggest that 
he would have said the same had there been nobody to 
hear him. 

“ Active, sir ! ” retorted John, with quite an expres- 
sion in his face ; “ that chap ! Hallo there ! You, sir ! 
Bring that horse here, and go and hang my wig on the 
weathercock, to show this gentleman whether you’re one 
of the lively sort or not.” 

Hugh made no answer, but throwing the bridle to his 
master, and snatching his wig from his head, in a man- 
ner so unceremonious and hasty that the action discom- 
posed Mr. Willet not a little, though performed at his 
own special desire, climbed nimbly to the very summit 
of the maypole before the house, and hanging the wig 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


17 


upon the weathercock, sent it twirling round like a roast- 
ing jack. Having achieved this performance, he cast it 
on the ground, and sliding down the pole with inconceiv- 
able rapidity, alighted on his feet almost as soon as it 
had touched the earth. 

“ There, sir,” said John, relapsing into his usual stolid 
state, “you won’t see that at many houses, besides the 
Maypole, where there’s good accommodation for man 
and beast — nor that neither, though that with him is 
nothing.” 

This last remark bore reference to his vaulting on 
horseback, as upon Mr. Chester’s first visit, and quickly 
disappearing by the stable-gate. 

“ That with him is nothing,” repeated Mr. Willet, 
brushing his wig with his wrist, and inwardly resolving 
to distribute a small charge for dust and damage to that 
article of dress, through the various items of his guest’s 
bill ; “ he’ll get out of a’most any winder in the house. 
There never was such a chap for flinging himself about 
and never hurting his bones. It’s my opinion, sir, that 
it’s pretty nearly all owing to his not having any imagi- 
nation ; and that if imagination could be (which it can’t) 
knocked into him, he’d never be able to do it any more. 
But we was a-talking, sir, about my son.” 

“ True, Willet, true,” said his visitor, turning again 
towards the landlord with his accustomed serenity of 
face. “ My good friend, what about him ? ” 

It has been reported that Mr. Willet, previously to 
making answer, winked. But as he never was known 
to be guilty of such lightness of conduct either before or 
afterwards, this may be looked upon as a malicious in- 
vention of his enemies — founded, perhaps, upon the 
undisputed circumstance of his taking his guest by the 

VOL. II. 2 


18 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


third breast button of his coat, counting downwards from 
the chin, and pouring his reply into his ear : — 

‘‘ Sir,” whispered John, with dignity, “ I know my 
duty. We want no love-making here, sir, unbeknown 
to parents. I respect a certain young gentleman, taking 
him in the light of a young gentleman ; I respect a cer- 
tain young lady, taking her in the light of a young lady ; 
but of the two as a couple, I have no knowledge, sir, 
none whatever. My son, sir, is upon his patrole.” 

“ I thought I saw him looking through the corner win- 
dow but this moment,” said Mr. Chester, who naturally 
thought that being on patrole, implied walking about 
somewhere. 

“ No doubt you did, sir,” returned John. “ He is 
upon his patrole of honor, sir, not to leave the premises. 
Me and some friends of mine that use the Maypole of an 
evening, sir, considered what was best to be done with 
him, to prevent his doing anything unpleasant in oppos- 
ing your desires ; and we’ve put him on his patrole. 
And what’s more, sir, he won’t be off his patrole for a 
pretty long time to come, I can tell you that.” 

When he had communicated this bright idea, which 
had had its origin in the perusal by the village cronies 
of a newspaper, containing among other matters, an 
account of how some officer pending the sentence of 
some court-martial had been enlarged on parole, Mr. 
Willet drew back from his guest’s ear, and without any 
visible alteration of feature, chuckled thrice audibly. 
This nearest approach to a laugh in which he ever in- 
dulged (and that but seldom and only on extreme occa- 
sions), never even curled his lip or effected the smallest 
change in — no, not so much as a slight wagging of — 
his great, fat, double chin, which at these times, as at all 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


19 


others, remained a perfect desert in the broad map of hia 
face ; one changeless, dull, tremendous blank. 

Lest it should be matter of surprise to any, that Mr. 
Willet adopted this bold course in opposition to one 
whom he had often entertained, and who had always 
paid his way at the Maypole gallantly, it may be re 
marked that it was his very penetration and sagacity in 
this respect, which occasioned him to indulge in those 
unusual demonstrations of jocularity, just now recorded. 
For Mr. Willet, after carefully balancing father and son 
in his mental scales, had arrived at the distinct conclu- 
sion that the old gentleman was a better sort of customer 
than the young one. Throwing his landlord into the 
same scale, which was already turned by this considera- 
tion, and heaping upon him again, his strong desires to 
run counter to the unfortunate Joe, and his opposition as 
a general principle to all matters of love and matrimony, 
it went down to the very ground straightway, and sent 
the light cause of the younger gentleman flying upwards 
to the ceiling. Mr. Chester was not the kind of man to 
be by any means dimsighted to Mr. Willet’s motives, 
but he thanked him as graciously as if he had been one 
of the most disinterested martyrs that ever shone on 
earth ; and leaving him with many complimentary re- 
liances on his great taste and judgment, to prepare what- 
ever dinner he might deem most fitting the occasion, bent 
his steps towards the Warren. 

Dressed with more than his usual elegance ; assuming 
a gracefulness of manner, which, though it was the re- 
sult of long study, sat easily upon him and became him 
well ; composing liis features into their most serene and 
prepossessing expression ; and setting in short that 
guard upon himself, at every point, which denoted that 


20 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


he attached no slight importance to the impression he 
was about to make ; he entered the bounds of Miss 
Haredale’s usual walk. He had not gone far, or looked 
about him long, when he descried coming towards him, a 
female figure. A glimpse of the form and dress as she 
crossed a little wooden bridge which lay between them, 
satisfied him that he had found her whom he desired to 
see. He threw himself in her way, and a very few 
paces brought them close together. 

He raised his hat from his head, and yielding the path, 
suffered her to pass him. Then, as if the idea had but 
that moment occurred to him, he turned hastily back 
and said in an agitated voice : 

“ I beg pardon — do I address Miss Haredale ? ” 

She stopped in some confusion at being so unexpect- 
edly accosted by a stranger ; and answered “ Yes.” 

“ Something told me,” he said, looking a compliment 
to her beauty, “ that it could be no other. Miss Hare- 
dale, I bear a name which is not unknown to you — 
which it is a pride, and yet a pain to me to know, sounds 
pleasantly in your ears. I am a man advanced in life, 
as you see. I am the father of him whom you honor 
and distinguish above all other men. May I for weighty 
reasons which fill me with distress, beg but a minute’s 
conversation with you here ? ” 

Who that was inexperienced in deceit, and had a 
frank and youthful heart, could doubt the speaker’s truth 
— could doubt it too, when the voice that spoke, was 
like the faint echo of one she knew so well, and so much 
loved to hear? She inclined her head, and stopping, 
cast her eyes upon the ground. 

“ A little more apart — among these trees. It is an 
old man’s hand, Miss Haredale ; an honest one, believe 
me.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


21 


She put hers in it as he said these words, and suffered 
him to lead her to a neighboring seat. 

o o 

“ You alarm me, sir,” she said in a low voice. “ You 
are not the bearer of any ill news, I hope ? ” 

^ “ Of none that you anticipate,” he answered, sitting 

down beside her. “ Edward is well — quite well. It 
is of hiqi I wish to speak, certainly ; but I have no mis- 
fortune to communicate.” 

She bowed her head again, and made as though she 
would have begged him to proceed ; but said nothing. 

“ I am sensible that I speak to you at a disadvantage, 
dear Miss Haredale. Believe me that I am not so for- 
getful of the feelings of my younger days as not to know 
that you are little disposed to view me with favor. You 
have heard me described as cold-hearted, calculating, 
selfish ” — 

“ I have never, sir,” — she interposed with an altered 
manner and a firmer voice ; “ I have never heard you 
spoken of in harsh or disrespectful terms. You do a 
great wrong to Edward’s nature if you believe him capa- 
ble of any mean or base proceeding.” 

“ Pardon me, my sweet young lady, but your un- 
cle”— 

“ Nor is it my uncle’s nature either,” she replied, with 
a heightened color in her cheek. “ It is not his nature 
to stab in the dark, nor is it mine to love such deeds.” 

She rose as she spoke, and would have left him ; but 
fie detained her with a gentle hand, and besought her in 
such persuasive accents to hear him but another minute, 
that she was easily prevailed upon to comply, and so sat 
down again. 

“And it is,” said Mr. Chester, looking upward, and 
apostrophizing the air ; “it is this frank, ingenuous, 


22 


BARNABir BUDGE. 


noble nature, Ned, that you can wound so lightly. 
Shame — shame upon you, boy ! ” 

She turned towards him quickly, and with a scornful 
look and flashing eyes. There were tears in Mr. Ches- 
ter’s, but he dashed them hurriedly away, as though un- 
willing that his weakness should be known, and regarded 
her with mingled admiration and compassion. ^ 

“ I never until now,” he said, “ believed, that the friv- 
olous actions of a young man could move me like these 
of my own son. I never knew till now, the worth of a 
woman’s heart, which boys so lightly win and lightly 
fling away. Trust me, dear young lady, that I never 
until now did know your worth ; and though an abhor- 
rence of deceit and falsehood has impelled me to seek 
you out, and would have done so had you been the poor- 
est and least gifted of your sex , I should have lacked 
the fortitude to sustain this interview could I have pic- 
tured you to my imagination as you really are.” 

Oh ! If Mrs. Varden could have seen the virtuous 
gentleman as he said these words, with indignation 
sparkling from his eyes — if she could have heard his 
broken, quavering voice — if she could have beheld him 
as he stood bareheaded in the sunlight, and with un- 
wonted energy poured forth his eloquence ! 

With a haughty face, but pale and trembling too, Em- 
ma regarded him in silence. She neither spoke nor 
moved, but gazed upon him as though she would look 
into his heart. 

“ I throw off,” said Mr. Chester, “ the restraint which 
natural affection would impose on some men, and reject 
all bonds but those of truth and duty. Miss Haredale^ 
you are deceived ; you are deceived by your unworthy 
lover, and my unworthy son.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


2b 


Still she looked at him steadily, and still said not one 
tvord. 

I have ever opposed his professions of love for you ; 
you will do me the justice, dear Miss Haredale, to re- 
member that. Your uncle and myself were enemies in 
early life, and if I had sought retaliation, I might have 
found it There. But as we grow older, we grow wiser — 
better, I would fain hope — and from the first, I have 
opposed him in this attempt. I foresaw the end, and 
would have spared you, if I could.” 

“ Speak plainly, sir,” she faltered. ‘‘ You deceive me, 
or are deceived yourself. I do not believe you — I can- 
not — I should not.” 

“ First,” said Mr. Chester, soothingly, “ for there may 
be in your mind some latent angry feeling to which I 
would not appeal, pray take this letter. It reached my 
hands by chance, and by mistake, and should have ac- 
counted to you (as I am told) for my son’s not answer- 
ing some other note of yours. God forbid, Miss Hare- 
dale,” said the good gentleman, with great emotion, “that 
there should be in your gentle breast one causeless 
ground of quarrel with him. You should know, and 
you will see, that he was in no fault here.” 

There appeared something so very candid, so scrupu- 
lously honorable, so very truthful and just in this course 
— something which rendered the upright person who re- 
sorted to it, so worthy of belief — that Emma’s heart, 
for the first time, sunk within her. She turned away, 
and burst into tears. 

“I would,” said Mr. Chester, leaning over her, and 
speaking in mild and quite venerable accents ; “ I would, 
dear girl, it were my task to banish, not increase, those 
tokens of your grief. My son, my erring son — I will 


u 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


not call him deliberately criminal in this, for men so 
young, who have been inconstant twice or thrice before, 
act without reflection, almost without a knowledge of 
the wrong they do, — will break his plighted faith to 
you ; has broken it even now. Shall I stop here, and 
having given you this warning, leave it to be fulfilled; 
or shall I go on ? ” 

“ You will go on, sir,” she answered, “ and speak more 
plainly yet, in justice both to him and me.” 

“ My dear girl,” said Mr. Chester, bending over her 
more affectionately still ; “ whom I would call my daugh- 
ter, but the Fates forbid, Edward seeks to break with 
you upon a false and most unwarrantable pretence. I 
have it on his own showing; in his own hand. Forgive 
me, if I have had a watch upon his conduct ; I am his 
father ; I had a regard for your peace and his honor, 
and no better resource was left me. There lies on his 
desk at this moment, ready for transmission to you, a 
letter, in which he tells you that our poverty — our 
poverty ; his and mine. Miss Haredale — forbids him to 
pursue his claim upon your hand ; in which he offers, 
voluntarily proposes, to free you from your pledge ; and 
talks niagnanimously (men do so, very commonly, in 
such cases) of being in time more worthy your regard 
— and so forth. A letter, to be plain, in which he not 
only jilts you — pardon the word ; I wmuld summon to 
your aid your pride and dignity — not only jilts you, I 
fear, in favor of the object whose slighting treatment 
first inspired his brief passion for yourself and gave it 
birth in wounded vanity, but affects to make a merit and 
a virtue of the act.” 

She glanced proudly at him once more, as by an in- 
voluntary impulse, and with a swelling breast rejoined, 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


25 


“ If what you say be true, he takes much needless trouble, 
sir, to compass his design. He is very tender of my 
peace of mind. I quite thank liim.’ 

“The truth of what I tell you, dear young lady,” he 
replied, “ you will test by the receipt or non-receipt of 
the letter of which I speak. — Haredale, my dear fel- 
low, I am delighted to see you, although we meet under 
singular circumstances, and upon a melancholy occasion. 
I hope you are very well.” 

At these words the young lady raised her eyes, which 
were filled with tears ; and seeing that her uncle indeed 
stood before them, and being quite unequal to the trial 
of hearing or of speaking one word more, hurriedly 
withdrew and left them. They stood looking at each 
other and at her retreating figure, and for a long time 
neither of them spoke. 

“ What does this mean ? Explain it,” said Mr. Hare- 
dale at length. “ Why are you here, and why with her ^ 

“ My dear friend,” rejoined the other, resuming his 
accustomed manner with infinite readiness, and throw- 
ing himself upon the bench with a weary air, “ you 
told me not very long ago, at that delightful old tavern 
of which you are the esteemed proprietor (and a most 
charming establishment it is for persons of rural pur- 
suits and in robust health, who are not liable to take 
cold), that I had the head and heart of an evil spirit 
in all matters of deception. I thought at the time ; I 
really did think ; you flattered me. But now I begin 
‘o wonder at your discernment, and vanity apart, do 
honestly believe you spoke the truth. Did you ever 
counterfeit extreme ingenuousness and honest indigna- 
tion ? My dear fellow, you have no conception, if you 
never did, how faint the effort makes one.” 


26 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Mr. Haredale surveyed him with a look of cold con- 
tempt. “ You may evade an explanation, I know,” he 
said, folding his arms. “ But I must have it. I can 
wait.” 

Not at all. Not at all, my good fellow. You shall 
not wait a moment,” returned his friend, as he lazily 
crossed his legs. “ The simplest thing in the world. 
It lies in a nutshell. Ned has written her a letter — 
a boyish, honest, sentimental composition, wdiich remains 
as yet in his desk, because he hasn’t had the heart to 
send it. I have taken a liberty, for which my parental 
affection and anxiety are a sufficient excuse, and pos- 
sessed myself of the contents. I have described them 
to your niec^ (a most enchanting person, Haredale ; 
quite an angelic creature), with a little coloring and 
description adapted to our purpose. It’s done. You 
may be quite easy. It’s all over. Deprived of their 
adherents and mediators ; her pride and jealousy roused 
to the utmost ; with nobody to undeceive her, and you 
to confirm me ; you will find that their intercourse will 
close with her answer. If she receives Ned’s letter by 
to-morrow noon, you may date their parting from to- 
morrow night. No thanks, I beg; you owe me none. 
I have acted for myself ; and if I have forwarded our 
compact with all the ardor even you could have desired, 
I have done so selfishly, indeed.” 

“ I curse the compact, as you call it, with my whole 
heart and soul,” returned the other. “ It was made in 
an evil hour. I have bound myself to a lie ; I have 
leagued myself with you ; and though I did so with a 
righteous motive, and though it cost me such an effort 
as haply few men know, I hate and despise myself for 
(he deed.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


27 


“ You are very warm,” said Mr. Chester with a lan- 
guid smile. 

“ I am warm. I am maddened by your coldness* 
’Death, Chester, if your blood ran warmer in your veins, 
and there were no restraints upon me, such as those that 
hold and drag me back — well ; it is done ; you tell 
me so, and on such a point I may believe you. When 
I am most remorseful for this treachery, I will think 
of you and your marriage, and try to justify myself in 
such remembrances, for having torn asunder Emma and 
your son, at any cost. Our bond is cancelled now, and 
we may part.” 

Mr. Chester kissed his hand gracefully ; and with the 
same tranquil face he 'had preserved throughout — even 
v.'hen he had seen his companion so tortured and trans- 
ported by his passion that his whole frame was shaken 
— lay in his lounging posture on the seat and watched 
him as he walked away. 

“ My scape-goat and my drudge at school,” he said, 
raising his head to look after him ; “ my friend of later 
days, who could not keep his mistress when he had won 
her, and threw me in her way to carry off the prize ; 
I triumph in the present and the past. Bark on, ill- 
favored, ill-conditioned cur ; fortune has ever been with 
me — I like to hear you.” 

The spot where they had met, was in an avenue ot 
trees, Mr. Haredale not passing out on either hand, had 
walked straight on. He chanced to turn his head when 
at some considerable distance, and seeing that his late 
companion had by that time risen and was looking after 
him, stood still as though he half expected him to fol- 
low and waited for his coming up. 

“ It may come to that one day, but not yet,” said Mr. 


28 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Chester, waving his hand, as though they were the best 
of friends, and turning away. “ Not yet, Haredale. 
Life is pleasant enough to me ; dull and full of heavi- 
ness to you. No. To cross swords with such a man 
— to indulge his humor unless upon extremity — would 
be weak indeed.” 

For all that, he drew his sword as he walked along, 
and in an absent humor ran his eye from hilt to point 
full twenty times. But thoughtfulness begets wrinkles ; 
remembering this, he soon put it up, smoothed his con- 
tracted brow, hummed a gay tune with greater gayety 
of manner, and was his unruffled self again. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


29 


CHAPTER XXX. 

A HOMELY proverb recognizes the existence of a 
troublesome class of persons who, having an inch con- 
ceded them, will take an ell. Not to quote the illus- 
trious examples of those heroic scourges of mankind, 
whose amiable path in life has been from birth to death 
through blood, and fire, and ruin, and who would seem 
to have existed for no better purpose than to teach 
mankind that as the absence of pain is pleasure, so the 
earth purged of their presence, may be deemed a blessed 
place — not to quote such mighty instances, it will be 
sufficient to refer to old John Willet. 

Old John having long encroached a good standard 
inch, full measure, on the liberty of Joe, and having 
snipped off* a Flemish ell in the matter of the parole, 
grew so despotic and so great, that his thirst for con- 
quest knew no bounds. The more young Joe submitted, 
the more absolute old John became. The ell soon faded 
into nothing. Yards, furlongs, miles arose ; and on went 
old John in the pleasantest manner possible, trimming 
off an exuberance in this place, shearing away some 
liberty of speech or action' in that, and conducting him- 
self in his small way with as much high mightiness 
and majesty, as the most glorious tyrant that ever had 
his statue reared in the public ways, of ancient or of 
modern times. 

As great men are urged on to the abuse of power 


30 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


(when they need urging, which is not often) by their 
flatterers and d(ipendents, so old John was impelled to 
these exercises of authority by the applause and ad- 
miration of his Maypole cronies, who, in the intervals 
of their nightly pipes and pots, would shake their heads 
and say that Mr. Willet was a father of the good old 
English sort; that there were no newfangled notions 
or modern ways in him ; that he put them in mind of 
what their fathers were when they were boys ; that 
there was no mistake about him ; that it would be well 
for the country if there were more like him, and more 
was the pity that there were not; with many other 
original remarks of that nature. Then they would con- 
descendingly give Joe to understand that it was all for 
his good, and he would be thankful for it one day ; 
and in particular, Mr. Cobb would acquaint him, that 
when he was his age, his father thought no more of 
giving him a parental kick, or a box on the ears, or a 
cuff on the head, or some little admonition of that sort, 
than he did of any other ordinary duty of life ; and he 
would further remark, with looks of great significance, 
that but for this judicious bringing up, he might have 
never been the man he was at that present speaking ; 
which was probable enough, as he was, beyond all ques- 
tion, the dullest dog of the party. In short, between old 
John, and old John’s friends, there never w^as an unfor- 
tunate young fellow so bullied, badgered, worried, fretted, 
and browbeaten ; so constantly beset, or made so tired 
of his life, as poor Joe Willet. 

This had come to be the recognized and established 
state of things ; but as John was very anxious to flour- 
ish his supremacy before the eyes of Mr. Chester, he 
did that day exceed himself, and did so goad and chafe 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


31 


his son and heir, that but for Joe’s having made a sol- 
emn vow to keep his hands in his pockets when they 
were not otherwise engaged, it is impossible to say what 
he might have done with them. But the longest day 
has an end, and at length Mr. Chester came down-stairs 
to mount his horse which was ready at the door. 

As old John was not in the way at the moment, Joe, 
who was sitting in the bar ruminating on his dismal fate 
and the manifold perfections of Dolly Varden, ran out 
to hold the guest’s stirrup, and assist him to mount. 
Mr. Chester was scarcely in the saddle, and Joe was 
in the very act of making him a graceful bow, when old 
John came diving out of the porch, and collared him. 

“ None of that, sir,” said John, “ none of that, sir. 
No breaking of patroles. How dare you come out of 
the door, sir, without leave ? You’re trying to get 
away, sir, are you, and to make a traitor of yourself 
again ? What do you mean, sir ? ” 

“ Let me go, father,” said Joe, imploringly, as he 
marked the smile upon their visitor’s face, and observed 
the pleasure his disgrace afforded him. “ This is too 
bad. Who wants to get away ? ” 

“ Who wants to get away ! ” cried John, shaking him. 
“ Why you do, sir, you do. You’re the boy, sir,” added 
John, collaring with one hand, and aiding the effect of a 
farewell bow to the visitor with the other, “ that wants 
to sneak into houses, and stir up differences between no- 
ble gentlemen and their sons, are you, eh ? . Hold youi 
tongue, sir.” 

Joe made no effort to reply. It was the crowning 
2ircumstance of his degradation. He extricated him- 
self from his father’s grasp, darted an angry look at 
the departing guest, and returned into the house. 


32 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ But for her,” thought Joe, as he threw his arms 
upon a table in the common room, and laid his head 
upon them, “ but for Dolly, who I couldn’t bear should 
think me the rascal they would make me out to be 
if I ran away, this house and I should part to- 
jiight.” 

It being evening by this time, Solomon Daisy, Tom 
Cobb, and Long Parkes, were all in the common room 
too, and had from the window been witnesses of what 
had just occurred. Mr. Willet joining them soon af- 
terwards, received the compliments of the company with 
great composure, and lighting his pipe sat down among 
them. 

“ We’ll see, gentlemen,” said John after a long pause, 
“ who’s the master of this house, and who isn’t. We’ll 
see whether boys are to govern men, or men are to 
govern boys.” 

“ And quite right too,” assented Solomon Daisy with 
some approving nods ; “ quite right, Johnny. Very 
good, Johnny. Well said, Mr. Willet. Brayvo, sir.” 

John slowly brought his eyes to bear upon him, 
looked at him for a long time, and finally made an- 
swer to the unspeakable consternation of his hearers, 
“ When I want encouragement from you, sir. I’ll ask 
you for it. You let nle alone, sir. I can get on with- 
out you, I hope. Don’t you tackle me, sir, if you 
please.” 

“ Don’t take it ill, Johnny ; I didn’t mean any harm,” 
pleaded the little man. 

“ Very good, sir,” said John, more than usually ob- 
stinate after his late success. “ Never mind, sir. I can 
stand pretty firm of myself, sir, I believe, without being 
shored up by you. And having given utterance to this 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


33 


retort, Mr. Willet fixed his eyes upon the hoiler, and fell 
into a kind of tobacco-trance. 

The spirits of the company being somewhat damped 
by this embarrassing line of conduct on the ])art of their 
host, nothing more was said for a long time ; but at 
length Mr. Cobb took upon himself to remark, as he 
rose to knock the ashes out of his pipe, that he hoped 
Joe wmuld thenceforth learn to obey his father in all 
things ; that he had found, that day, he was not one of 
the sort of men who were to be trifled with ; and that 
he would recommend him, poetically speaking, to mind 
his eye for the future. ^ 

“ I’d recommend you, in return,” said Joe, looking up 
with a flushed face, “not to talk to me.” 

“Hold your tongue, sir,” cried Mr. Willet, suddenly 
rousing himself, and turning round. 

“ I won’t, father,” cried Joe, smiting the table with 
his fist, so that the jugs and glasses rung again ; “ these 
things are hard enough to bear from you ; from anybody 
else I never will endure them any more. Therefore I 
say, Mr. Cobb, don’t talk to me.” 

“ Why, who are you,” said Mr. Cobb, sneeringly, 
“ that you’re not to be talked to, eh, Joe ? ” 

To which Joe returned no answer, but with a very 
ominous shake of the head, resumed his old position, 
which he would have peacefully preserved until the 
house shut up at night, but that Mr. Cobb, stimulated 
by the wonder of the company at the young man’s pre- 
sumption, retorted with sundry taunts, which proved too 
much for flesh and blood to bear. Crowding into one 
moment thewexation and the wrath of years, Joe started 
up, overturned the table, fell upon his long enemy, pom- 
melled him with all his might and main, and finished by 

VOT.- TJ. 8 


34 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


driving him with surprising swiftness against a heap of 
spittoons in one corner ; plunging into which, head fore- 
most, with a tremendous crash, he lay at full length 
among the ruins, stunned and motionless. Then, with- 
out waiting to receive the compliments of the by-stand- 
ers on the victory he had won, he retreated to his own 
bedchamber, and considering himself in a state of siege, 
piled all the portable furniture against the door by way 
of barricade. 

“ I have done it now,” said Joe, as he sat down upon 
his bedstead and wiped his heated face. “I knew it 
would come at last. The Maypole and I must part 
company, Tm a roving vagabond — she hates me lor 
evermore — it’s all over ! ” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


35 


CHAPTER XXXL 

Pondering on his unhappy lot, Joe sat and listened 
for a long time, expecting every moment to hear their 
creaking footsteps on the stairs, or to be greeted by his 
worthy father with a summons to capitulate uncondition- 
ally, and deliver himself up straightway. But neither 
voice nor footsteps came ; and though some distant 
echoes, as of closing doors and people hurrying in and 
out of rooms, resounding from time to time through the 
great passages, and penetrating to his remote seclusion, 
gave note of unusual commotion down-stairs, no nearer 
sound disturbed his place of retreat, which seemed the 
quieter for these far-off noises, and was as dull and full 
of gloom as any hermit’s cell. 

' It came on darker and darker. The old-fashioned 
furniture of the chamber, which was a kind of hospital 
for all the invalided movables in the house, grew indis- 
tinct and shadowy in its many shapes ; chairs and tables, 
which by day were as honest cripples as need be, as- 
sumed a doubtful and mysterious character ; and one 
old leprous screen of faded India leather and gold bind- 
ing, which had kept out many a cold breath of air in 
days of yore and shut in many a jolly face, frowned on 
him with a spectral aspect, and stood at full height in 
its allotted corner, like some gaunt ghost who waited 
to be questioned. A portrait opposite the window — 
a queer, old gray-eyed general, in an oval frame — 


36 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


seemed to wink and doze as the light decayed, and at 
length, when the last faint glimmering speck of day 
went out, to shut its eyes in good earnest, and fall sound 
asleep. There was such a hush and mystery about 
everything, that Joe could not help following its ex- 
ample ; and so went off into a slumber likewise, and 
dreamed of Dolly, till the clock of Chigwell church 
struck two. ‘ 

Still nobody came. The distant noises in the house 
had ceased, and out of doors all was quiet too ; save for 
the occasional barking of some deep-mouthed dog, and 
the shaking of the branches by the night wind. He 
gazed mournfully out of window at each well-known 
object as it lay sleeping in the dim light of the moon ; 
and creeping back to his former seat, thought about the 
late uproar, until, with long thinking of, it seemed to 
have occurred a month ago. Thus, between dozing, 
and thinking, and walking to the window and looking 
out, the night wore away ; the grim old screen, and the 
kindred chairs and tables, began slowly to reveal them- 
selves in their accustomed forms ; the gray-eyed general 
seemed to wink and yawn and rouse himself ; and at 
last he was broad awake again, and very uncomfortable 
and cold and haggard he looked, in the dull gray light 
of morning. « 

The sun had begun to peep above the forest trees, and 
already flung across the curling mist bright bars of gold, 
when Joe dropped from his window on the ground below, 
a little bundle and his trusty stick, and prepared to de- 
scend himself. 

It was not a very difficult task ; for there were so 
many projections and gable ends in the way, that they 
ffirmed a series of clumsy steps, with no greater obstacle 


BARNABY RUDGF. 


37 


than a jump of some few feet at last. ’Joe, with hia 
stick and bundle on his shoulder, quipkly stood on the 
firm earth, and looked up at the old Maypole, it might 
be for the last time. 

He didn’t apostrophize it, for he was no great scholar. 
He didn’t curse it, for he had little ill-will to give to any- 
thing on earth. He felt more affectionate and kind to it 
than ever he had done in all his life before, so said with 
all his heart, “ God bless you ! ” as a parting wish, and 
turned away. 

He walked along at a brisk pace, big with great 
thoughts of going for a soldier and dying in some foreign 
country where it was very hot and sandy, and leaving 
God knows what unheard-of wealth in prize-money to 
Dolly, who would be very much affected when she came 
to know of it ; and full of such youthful visions, which 
were sometimes sanguine and sometimes melancholy, but 
always had her for their main point and centre, pushed 
on vigorously until the noise of London sounded in his 
ears, and the Black Lion hove in sight. 

It was only eight o’clock then, and very much as- 
tonished the Black Lion was, to see him come walking 
in with dust upon his feet at that early hour, with no* 
gray mare to bear him company. But as he ordered 
breakfast to be got ready with all speed, and on its being 
set before him gave indisputable tokens of a hearty ap- 
petite, the Lion received him, as usual, with a hospitable 
welcome ; and treated him with those marks of distinc- 
tion, which, as a regular customer, and one within the 
freemasonry of the trade, he had a right to claim.' 

This Lion or landlord, — for he was called both man 
and beast, by reason of his having instructed the artist 
who painted his sign, to convey into the features of the 


58 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


lordly brute whose effigy it bore, as near a counterpart 
of his own face as his skill could compass and devise, — 
was a gentleman almost as quick of apprehension, and 
of almost as subtle a wit, as the mighty John himself. 
But the difference between them lay in this ; that 
whereas Mr. Willet’s extreme sagacity and acuteness 
were the efforts of unassisted nature, the Lion stood 
indebted, in no small amount, to beer ; of which he 
swigged such copious draughts, that most of his facul- 
ties were utterly drowned and washed away, except the 
one great faculty of sleep, which he retained in surpris- 
ing perfection. The creaking Lion over the house-door 
was, therefore, to say the truth, rather a drowsy, tame, 
and feeble lion ; and as these social representatives of 
a savage class are usually of a conventional character 
(being depicted, for the most part, in impossible attitudes 
and of unearthly colors) he was frequently supposed by 
the more ignorant and uninformed among the neighbors, 
to be the veritable portrait of the host as he appeared on 
the occasion of some great funeral ceremony or public 
mourning. 

“ What noisy fellow is that in the next room ? ” said 
ffoe, when he had disposed of his breakfast, and had 
washed and brushed himself. 

“ A recruiting sergeant,” replied the Lion. 

Joe started involuntarily. Here was the very thing 
he had been dreaming of, all the way along. 

“ And I wish,” said the Lion, “ he was anywhere else 
but here. The party make noise enough, but they don’t 
call for much. There’s great cry tliere, Mr. Willet, but 
very little wool. Your father wouldn’t like ’em, 1 know.” 

Perhaps not much under any circumstances. Per- 
haps if he could have known "what was passing at that 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


39 


moment in Joe’s mind, he would have liked them still 
less. 

“ Is he recruiting for a — for a fine regiment ? ” said 
Joe, glancing at a little round mirror that hung in the 
bar. 

“ I believe he is,” replied the host. It’s much 
the same thing, whatever regiment he’s recruiting for. 
Pm told there a’n’t a deal of difference between a fine 
man and another one, when they’re shot through and 
through.” 

“ They’re not all shot,” said Joe. 

‘‘ No,” the Lion answered, “ not all. Those that are 
— supposing it’s done easy — are the best off in my 
opinion.” 

“ Ah ! ” retorted Joe, “ but you don’t care for glory.” 

“ For what ? ” said the Lion. 

« Glory.” 

“ No,” returned the Lion, with supreme indifference. 
“ I don’t. You’re right in that, Mr. Willet. When 
Glory comes here, and calls for anything to drink and 
changes a guinea to pay for it. I’ll give it him for noth- 
ing. It’s ray belief, sir, that the Glory’s arms wouldn’t 
do a very strong business.” 

These remarks were not at all comforting. Joe walked 
out, stopped at the door of the next room, and listened. 
The sergeant was describing a military life. It was all 
drinking, he said, except that there were frequent inter- 
vals of eating and love-making. A battle was the fines 
thing in the world — when your side won it — and 
Englishmen always did that. “ Supposing you should 
be killed, sir ? ” said a timid voice in one corner. “ Well, 
sir, supposing you should be,” said the sergeant, “ what 
then ? Your country loves you, sir ; his Majesty King 


40 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


George the Third loves you ; your memory is honored, 
revered, respected ; everybody’s fond of you, and grate- 
ful to you ; your name’s wrote down at full length in a 
book in the War-ofRce. Damme, gentlemen, we must 
all die some time, or another, eh ? ” 

The voice coughed, and said no more. 

Joe w^alked into the room. A group of half a dozen 
fellows had gathered together in the tap-room, and were 
listening with greedy ears. One of them, a carter in a 
smock frock, seemed wavering and disposed to enlist. 
The rest, who were by no means disposed, strongly 
urged him to do so (according to the custom of man- 
kind), backed the sergeant’s arguments, and grinned 
among themselves. “ I say nothing, boys,” said the 
sergeant, who sat a little apart drinking his liquor. 
“For lads of spirit” — here he cast an eye on Joe — 
“ this is the time. I don’t want to inveigle you. The 
king’s not come to that, I hope. Brisk young blood is 
what we want ; not milk and water. We won’t take five 
men out of six. We want top-sawyers, we do. I’m not 
a-going to tell tales out of school, but, damme, if every 
gentleman’s son that carries arms in our corps, through 
being under'a cloud and having little difierences with his 
relations, was counted up ” — here his eye fell on Joe 
again, and so good-naturedly, that Joe beckoned him out. 
H- came directly. 

“ You’re a gentleman, by G — ! ” was his first re- 
mark, as he slapped him on the back. “ You’re a 
gentleman in disguise. So am I. Let’s swear a friend- 
ship.” 

Joe didn’t exactly do that, but he shook hands with 
Mm, and thanked him for his good opinion. 

'* You want to serve,” said his new friend. “ You 


BARNABY KUDGE. 


41 


shall. You were made for it. YouVe one of us by 
nature. What’ll you take to drink ? ” 

“ Nothing just now,” replied Joe, smiling faintly. “ 1 
haven’t quite made up my mind.” 

^ “A mettlesome fellow like you, and not made up his 
mind ! ” cried the sergeant. “ Here — let me give the 
bell a pull, and you’ll make up your mind in half a 
minute, I know.” 

“ You’re right so far ” — answered Joe, “ for if you 
pull the bell here, where I’m known, there’ll be an end 
of my soldiering inclinations in no time. Look in my 
face. You see me, do you?” 

“ I do,” replied the sergeant with an oath, “ and a 
finer young fellow or one better qualified to serve his 
king and country, I never set my ” — he used an adjec- 
tive in this place — “ eyes on.” 

Thank you,” said Joe, “ I didn’t ask you for want of 
a compliment, but thank you all the same. Do I look 
like a sneaking fellow or a liar ? ” 

The sergeant rejoined with many choice asseverations 
that he didn’t ; and that if his (the sergeant’s) own father 
were to say he did, he would run the old gentleman 
through the body cheerfully, and consider it a meri- 
torious action. 

Joe expressed his obligations, and continued, “You 
can trust me then, and credit what I say. I believe I 
shall enlist into your regiment to-night. The reason 
I don’t do so now is because I don’t want until to- 
night, to do what I can’t recall. Where shall I find 
you this evening?” 

His friend replied with some unwillingness, and after 
much ineffectual entreaty having for its object the im- 
mediate settlement of the business, that his quarters 


42 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


would be at the Crooked Billet in Tower-street; where 
he would be found waking until midnight, and sleeping 
until breakfast time to-morrow. 

“ And if I do come — which it’s a million to one, I 
shall — when will you take me out of London ? ” de- 
manded Joe. 

“ To-morrow morning, at half after eight o’clock,” re- 
plied the sergeant. “ You’ll go abroad — a country 
where it’s all sunshine and plunder — the finest climate 
in the world.” 

“ To go abroad,” said Joe, shaking hands with him, “is 
the very thing 1 want. You may expect me.” 

“ You’re the kind of lad for us,” cried the sergeant, 
holding Joe’s hand in his, in the excess of his admiration. 
“ You’re the boy to push your fortune. I don’t say it 
because I bear you any envy, or would take away from 
the credit of the rise you’ll make, but if I had been bred 
and taught like you, I’d have been a colonel by this 
time.” 

“ Tush man ! ” said Joe, “ I’m not so young as that. 
Needs must when the devil drives ; and the devil that 
drives me is an empty pocket and an unhappy home. 
For the present, good-by.” 

“ For king and country ! ” cried the sergeant, flourish- 
ing his cap. 

“ For bread and meat ! ” cried Joe, snapping his fin- 
gers. And so they parted. 

He had very little money in his pocket ; so little in 
deed, that after paying for his breakfast (which he was 
too honest and perhaps too proud to score up to his 
father’s charge) he had but a penny left. He had cour- 
age, notwithstanding, to resist all the affectionate impor- 
tunities of the sergeant, who waylaid him at the door 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


43 


with many protestations of eternal friendship, and did in 
particular request that he would do him the favor to ac- 
cept of only one shilling as a tem})orary accommodation. 
Rejecting his offers both of cash and credit, Joe walked 
away with stick and bundle as before, bent upon getting 
through the day as he best could, and going down to the 
locksmith’s in the dusk of the evening ; for it should go 
hard, he had resolved, but he would have a parting word 
with charming Dolly Varden. 

He went out by Islington and so on to Highgate, and 
sat on many stones and gates, but there were no voices 
in the bells to bid him turn. Since the time of noble 
Whittington, fair flower of merchants, bells have come 
to have less sympathy with humankind. They only 
ring for money and on state occasions. Wanderers 
have increased in number ; ships leave the Thames for 
distant regions, carrying from stem to stern no other 
cargo ; the bells are silent ; they ring out no entreaties 
or regrets ; they are used to it and have grown worldly. 

Joe bought a roll, and reduced his purse to the condi- 
tion (with a difference) of that celebrated purse of For- 
tunatus, which, whatever were its favored owner’s neces- 
sities, had one unvarying amount in it. In these real 
times, when all the Fairies are dead and buried, there 
are still a great many purses which possess that quality 
The sum-total they contain is expressed in arithmetic by 
a circle, and whether it be added to or multiplied by its 
own amount, the result of the problem is more easily 
stated than any known in figures. 

Evening drew on at last. With the desolate and soli 
Jary feeling of one who had no home or shelter, and was 
alone utterly in the world for the first time, he bent his 
steps towards the locksmith’s house. He had delayed till 


44 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


now, knowing that Mrs. Varden sometimes went out alone, 
or with Miggs for her sole attendant, to lectures in the 
evening ; and devoutly hoping that this might be one of 
her nights of moral culture. 

He had walked up and down before the house,, on the 
opposite side of the way, two or three times, when as he 
returned to it again, he caught a glimpse of a fluttering 
skirt at the door. It was Dolly’s — to whom else could 
it belong ? no dress but hers had such a flow as that. 
He plucked up his spirits, and followed it into the work- 
shop of the Golden Key. 

His darkening the door caused her to look round. Oh 
that face ! “ If it hadn’t been for that,” thought Joe, “ I 

should never have walked into poor Tom Cobb. She’s 
twenty times handsomer than ever. She might marry 
a Lord!” 

He didn’t say this. He only thought it — perhaps 
looked it also. Dolly was glad to see him, and was so 
sorry her father and mother were away from home. Joe 
begged she wouldn’t mention it on any account. 

Dolly hesitated to lead the way into the parlor, for 
there it was nearly dark ; at the same time she hesitated 
to stand talking in the workshop, which was yet light and 
open to the street. They had got by some means, too, be- 
fore the little forge; and Joe having her hand in his (which 
he had no right to have, for Dolly only gave it him to 
shake), it was so like standing before some homely altai 
being married, that it was the most embarrassing state 
of things in the world. 

“ I have come,” said Joe, “ to say good-by — to say 
good-by for I don’t know how many years ; perhaps for- 
ever. I am going abroad.” 

Now this was exactly what he should not have said. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


45 


Here he was, talking like a gentleman at large who was 
free to come and go and ro^m about the world at hia 
pleasure, when that gallant coach-maker had vowed but 
the night before that Miss Varden held him bound in 
adamantine chains ; and had positively stated in so many 
words that she was killing him by inches, and that in a 
fortnight more or thereabouts he expected to make a 
decent end and leave the business to his mother. 

Dolly released her hand and said “ Indeed ! ” She re- 
marked in the same breath that it was a fine night, and 
in short, betrayed no more emotion than the forge itself. 

“ I couldn’t go,” said Joe, “ without coming to see you. 
I hadn’t the heart to.” 

Dolly was more sorry than she could tell, that he 
should have taken so much trouble. It was such a long 
way, and he must have such a deal to do. And how was 
Mr. Willet — that dear old gentleman ” — 

“ Is this all you say ! ” cried Joe. 

All ! Good gracious, what did the man expect ! She 
was obliged to take her apron in her hand and run her 
eyes along the hem from corner to corner, to keep her- 
self from laughing in his face ; — not because his gaze 
confused her — not at all. 

Joe had small experience in love-affairs, and had no 
notion how different young ladies are at different times ; 
he had expected to take Dolly up again at the very point 
where he had left her after that delicious evening ride, 
and was no more prepared for such an alteration than to 
see the sun and moon change places. He had buoyed 
himself up all day with an indistinct idea that she would 
certainly say “ Don’t go,” or “ Don’t leave us,” or “ Why 
do you go ? ” or “ Why do you Ifave us ? ” or would 
give him some little encouragement of that sort ; he had 


46 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


3ven entertained the possibility of her bursting into tears, 
of her throwing herself into his arms, of her falling 
down in a fainting fit without previous word or sign ; 
but any approach to such a line of conduct as this, had 
been so far from his thoughts that he could only look at 
her in silent wonder. 

Dolly in the mean while turned to the corners of her 
apron, and measured the sides, and smoothed out the 
wrinkles, and was as silent as he. At last, after a long 
pause, Joe said good-by. “ Good-by,” — said Dolly — 
with as pleasant a smile as if he were going into the 
next street, and were coming back to supper ; “ good-by.” 

“ Come,” said Joe, putting out both his hands, “ Dolly, 
dear Dolly, don’t let us part like this. I love you dearly, 
with all my heart and soul ; with as much truth and 
earnestness as ever man loved woman in this world, I 
do believe. I am a poor fellow, as you know — poorer 
now than ever, for I have fled from home, not being able 
to bear it any longer, and must fight my own way with- 
out help. You are beautiful, admired, are loved by 
everybody, are well off and happy ; and may you ever 
be so ! Heaven forbid I should ever make you other- 
wise ; but give me a word of comfort. Say something 
kind to me. I have no right to expect it of you, I know', 
but I ask it because I love you, and shall treasure the 
slightest word from you all through my life. Dolly dear- 
est, have you nothing to say to me ? ” 

No. Nothing. Dolly was a coquette by nature, and 
a spoilt child. She had no notion of being carried by 
storm in this way. The coach-maker would have been 
dissolved in tears, and \vould have knelt down, and called 
himself names, and clasped his hands, and beat his 
breast, and tugged wildly at his cravat, and done all 


BAKNABY RUDGE. 


47 


kinds of poetry. Joe had no business to be going abroad. 
He had no right, to be able to do it. If he was in ada- 
mantine chains, he couldn’t. 

“ I have said good-by,” said Dolly, “ twice. Take 
your arm away directly, Mr. Joseph, or I’ll call Miggs.” 

“ I’ll not reproach you,” answered Joe, “ it’s my fault, 
no doubt. I hav^ thought sometimes that you didn’t 
quite despise me, but I was a fool to think so. Every 
one must, who has seen the life I have led — you most 
of all. God bless you !.” 

He was gone, actually gone. Dolly waited a little 
while, thinking he would return, peeped out at the door, 
looked up the street and down as well as the increasing 
darkness would allow, came in again, waited a little 
longer, went up-stairs humming a tune, bolted herself 
in, laid her head down on her bed, and cried as if her 
heart would break. And yet such natures are made up 
of so many contradictions, that if Joe Willet had come 
back that night, next day, next week, next month, the 
odds are a hundred to one she would have treated him 
in the very same manner, and have wept for it after- 
wards with the very same distress. 

She had no sooner left' the workshop than there cau- 
tiously peered out from behind the chimney of the forge, 
a face which had already emerged from the same con- 
cealment twice or thrice, unseen, and which, after satis- 
ying itself that it was now alone, was followed by a leg, 
a shoulder, and so on by degrees, until the form of Mr 
Tappertit stood confessed, with a brown paper cap stuck 
negligently on one side of its head, and its arms very 
much a-kimbo. 

“ Have iny ears deceived me,” said the ’Prentice, “ or 
do I dream ! am I to thank thee, Fortun’, or to cus thee 
' — which ? ” 


43 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


He gravely descended from his elevation, took down 
his piece of looking-glass, planted it against the wall 
upon the usual bench, twisted his head round, and looked 
closely at his legs. 

“ If they’re a dream,” said Sim, “ let sculptures have 
such wisions, and chisel em out when they wake. This 
is reality. Sleep has no such limbs as them. Tremble, 
Willetj'and despair. She’s mine ! She’s mine ! ” 

With these triumphant expressions, he seized a ham- 
mer and dealt a heavy blow at a vice, which in his 
mind’s eye represented the sconce or head of Joseph 
Willet. ' That done, he burst into a peal cf laughter 
which startled Miss Miggs even in her distant kitchen, 
and dipping his head into a bowl of water, had recourse 
to a jack-towel inside the closet-door, which served the 
double purpose of smothering his feelings and drying his 
face. 

Joe, disconsolate and down-hearted, but full of courage 
too, on leaving the locksmith’s house made the best of 
his way to the Crooked Billet, and there inquired for his 
friend the sergeant, who, expecting no man less, received 
him with open arms. In the course of five minutes after 
his arrival at that house of entertainment, he was en- 
rolled among the gallant defenders of his native land ; 
and within half an hour, was regaled with a steaming 
supper of boiled tripe and onions, prepared, as his friend 
assured him more than once, at the express command of 
his most Sacred Majesty the King. To this meal, which 
tasted very savory after his long fasting, he did ample 
justice ; and when he had followed it up, or down, with 
a variety of loyal and patriotic toasts, he was conducted 
lo a straw mattress in a loft over the stable, and locked 
In there for the night. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


49 


The next morning, he found that the obliging care of 
his martial friend had decorated his hat with sundry 
particolored streamers, which made a very lively ap- 
pearance ; and in company with that officer, and three 
other military gentlemen newly enrolled, wffio were un- 
der a cloud so dense that it only left three shoes, a boot, 
and a coat and a half visible among them, repaired to 
the river side. Here they were joined by a corporal 
and four more heroes, of whom two were drunk and 
daring, and two sober and penitent, but . each of whom, 
like Joe, had his dusty stick and bundle. ' The party 
embarked in a passage-boat bound for Gravesend, 
whence they were to proceed on foot to Chatham ; the 
wind was in their favor, and they soon left London be- 
hind them, a mere dark mist — a giant phantom in 
the 'air. 


vou n. 

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:.L 5 . ■ -.J 7 

’ it i‘! "1 . . i : 1 ^ 

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50 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


CHAPTER XXXII. 

Misfortunes, saith the adage, never come singly. 
There is little doubt that troubles are exceedingly gre* 
garious in their nature, and flying in flocks, are apt to 
perch capriciously ; crowding on the heads of some poor 
wights until there is not an inch of room left on their 
unlucky crowns, and taking no more notice of others 
who offer as good resting-places for the soles of their 
feel, than if they had no existence. It may have hap- 
pened that a flight of troubles brooding over London, 
and looking out for Joseph Willet, whom they couldn’t 
find, darted down haphazard on the first young man 
that caught their fancy, and settled on him instead. 
However this may be, certain it is that on the very day 
of Joe’s departure they swarmed about the ears of Ed- 
ward Chester, and did so buzz and flap their wings, and 
persecute him, that he was most profoundly w^retched. 

It was evening, and just eight o’clock, when he and 
his father, having wine and dessert set before them, were 
left to themselves for the first time that day. They had 
dined together, but a third person had been present dur- 
ing the meal, and until they met at table they had not 
seen each other since the previous night. 

Edward was reserved and silent, Mr. Chester was 
more than usually gay ; but not caring, as it seemed, to 
open a conversation with one whose humor was so dif- 
ferent, he vented the lightness of his spirit in smiles and 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


51 


sparkling looks, and made no effort to awaken his atten- 
tion. So they remained for some time : the father lying 
on a sofa with his accustomed air of graceful negligence ; 
the son seated opposite to him with downcast eyes, 
busied, it was plain, with painful and uneasy thoughts. 

“ My dear Edward,” said Mr. Chester at length, with 
a most engaging laugh, “ do not extend your drowsy 
influence to the decanter. Suffer that to circulate, let 
your spirits be never so stagnant.” 

Edward begged his pardon, passed it, and relapsed 
into his former state. 

^^You do wrong not to fill your glass,” said Mr. 
Chester, holding up his own before the light. “Wine 
in moderation — not in excess, for that makes men ugly 
— has a thousand pleasant influences. It brightens the 
eye, improves the voice, imparts a new vivacity to one’s 
thoughts and conversation : you should try it, Ned.” 

“ Ah father ! ” cried his son, “ if” — 

“My good fellow,” interposed the parent hastily, as 
he set down his glass, and raised- his eyebrows with a 
startled and horrified expression, “ for heaven’s sake 
don’t call me by that obsolete and ancient name. Have 
some regard for delicacy. Am I gray, or wrinkled, do 
I go on crutches, have I lost my teeth, that you adopt 
such a mode of address ? Good God, how very coarse ! ” 
“I was about to speak to you from my heart, sir,” 
returned Edward, “ in the confidence which should sub 
ist between us; and you check me in the outset.” 

* “ Now do, Ned, do not,” said Mr. Chester, raising his 

delicate hand imploringly, “ talk in that monstrous man- 
ner. About to speak from your heart. Don’t you know 
that the heart is an ingenious part of our formation — 
the centre of the bloodvessels and all that sort of thing 


52 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


— which has no more to do with what you say or think, 
than your knees have ? How can you be so very vulgar 
and absurd ? These anatomical allusions should be left 
to gentlemen of the medical profession. They are really 
not agreeable in society. You quite surprise me, Ned.” 

“ Well ! there are no such things to wound, or heal, or 
have regard for. I know your creed, sir, and will say 
no more,” returned his son. 

“There again,” said Mr. Chester, sipping his wine, 
‘ you are wrong. I distinctly say there are such things. 
We know there are. The hearts of animals — of bul- 
locks, sheep, and so forth — are cooked and devoured, as 
I am told, by the lower classes, with a vast deal of relish. 
Men are sometimes stabbed to the heart, shot to the 
heart ; but as to speaking from the heart, or to the heart, 
or being warm-hearted, or cold-hearted, or broken- 
hearted, or being all heart, or having no heart — pah ! 
these things are nonsense, Ned.” 

“ No doubt, sir,” returned his son, seeing that he 
paused for him to speak. “ No doubt.” 

“ There’s Haredale’s niece, your late flame,” said Mr. 
Chester, as a careless illustration of his meaning. “ No 
doubt in your mind she was all heart once. Now she 
has none at all. Yet she is the same person, Ned, ex- 
actly.” 

“ She is a changed person, sir,” cried Edward, redden- 
ing ; “ and changed by vile means, I believe.” 

“ You have had a cool dismissal, have you ? ” said his 
father. “ Poor Ned ! I told you last night what would 
happen. — May I ask you for the nut-crackers ? ” 

“ She has been tampered with, and most treacherously 
deceived,” cried Edward, rising from his seat. “ I never 
will believe that tlie knowledge of my real position, 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


53 


given her by myself, has worked this change. I know 
she is beset and tortured. But though our contract is 
at an end, and broken past all redemption ; though I 
charge upon her want of firmness and want of truth, 
both to herself and me ; I do not now, and never will 
believe, that any sordid motive, or her own unbiassed 
will, has led her to this course — never ! ” 

“You make me blush,” returned his father, gayly, 
“for the folly of your nature, in which — but we never 
know ourselves — I devoutly hope there is no reflection 
of my own. With regard to the young lady herself, she 
has done what is very natural and proper, my dear fel- 
low ; what you yourself proposed, as I learn from Hare- 
dale ; and what I predicted — with no great exercise of 
sagacity — she would do. She supposed you to be rich, 
or at least quite rich enough ; and found you poor. 
Marriage is a civil contract ; people marry to better 
their worldly condition and improve appearances ; it is 
an affair of house and furniture, of liveries, servants, 
equipage, and so forth. The lady being poor and you 
poor also, there is an end of the matter. You cannot 
enter upon these considerations, and have no manner of 
business with the ceremony. I drink her health in this 
glass, and respect and honor her for her extreme good 
sense. It is a lesson to you. Fill yours, Ned.” 

“ It is a lesson,” returned his son, “ by which I hope I 
may never profit, and if years and their experience im- 
press it on ” — 

“ Don’t say on the heart,” interposed his father. 

“ On men whom the world and its hypocrisy have 
spoiled,” said Edward, warmly ; “ Heaven keep me from 
its knowledge.” 

“ Come, sir,” returned his father, raising himself a lit- 


54 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


tie on the sofa, and looking straight towards him ; wo 
have had enough of this. Remember, if you please, 
your interest, your duty, your moral obligations, your 
filial affections, and all that sort of thing which it is so 
very delightful and charming to reflect upon ; or you 
will repent it.” 

I shall never repent the preservation of my self- 
respect, sir,” said Edward. “ Forgive me if I say that 
I will not sacrifice it at your bidding, and that I will not 
pursue the track which you would have me take, and to 
which the secret share you have had in this late sepa- 
ration tends.” 

His father rose a little higher still, and looking at him 
as though curious to know if he were quite resolved and 
earnest, dropped gently down again, and said in the 
calmest voice, eating his nuts meanwhile, 

Edward, my father had a son, whom being a fool like 
you, and, like you, entertaining low and disobedient sen- 
timents, he disinherited and cursed one morning after 
breakfast. The circumstance occurs to me wdth a singular 
clearness of recollection this evening. I remember eat- 
ing muffins at the time with marmalade. He led a mis- 
erable life (the son, I mean) and died early ; it was a 
happy release on all accounts ; he degraded the family 
very much. It is a sad circumstance, Edward, when a 
father finds it necessary to resort to such strong meas- 
ures.” 

“ It is,” replied Edward, “ and it is sad when a son, 
proffering him his love and duty in their best and truest 
sense, finds himself repelled at every turn, and forced to 
disobey. Dear father,” he added, more earnestly though 
in a gentler tone, “ I have reflected many times on what 
occurred between us when we first discussed this subject. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


55 


Let there be a confidence between us ; not in terms, but 
truth. Hear what I have to say.” 

“ As I anticipate what it is, and cannot fail to do so, 
Edward,” returned his father coldly, “ I decline. I 
couldn’t possibly. I am sure it would put me out of 
emper, which is a state of mind I can’t endure. If you 
ntend to mar my plans for your establishment in life, 
and the preservation of that gentility and becoming 
pride, which our family have so long sustained — if, in . 
short, you are resolved to take your own course, you 
must take it, and my curse with it. I am very sorry, 
but there’s really no alternative.” 

“ The curse may pass your lips,” said Edward, “ but 
it will be but empty breath. I do not believe that any 
man on earth has greater power to call one down upon 
his fellow — least of all, upon his own child — than he 
has to make one drop of rain or fiake of snow fall from 
the clouds above us at his impious bidding. Beware, 
sir, what you do.” 

“ You are so very irreligious, so exceedingly unduti- 
ful, so horribly profane,” rejoined his father, turning his 
face lazily towards him, and cracking another nut, “ that 
I positively must interrupt you here. It is quite impos- 
sible we can continue to go on, upon such terms as these. 
If you will do me the favor to ring the bell, the servant 
will show you to the door. Return to this roof no more, 

[ beg you. Go, sir, since you have no moral sense re- 
naining ; and go to the Devil, at my express desire. 
Good-day.” 

Edward left the room without another word or look, 
iuid turned his back upon the house forever. 

The father’s face was slightly flushed and heated, but 


56 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


liis manner was quite unchanged, as he rang the bell 
again, and addressed his servant on his entrance. 

“ Peak — if that gentleman who has just gone out” — 
“ I beg your pardon, sir, Mr. Edward ? ” 

“ Were there more than one, dolt, that you ask the 
question? — If that gentleman should send here for his 
wardrobe, let him have it, do you hear ? If he should 
call himself at any time. Pm not at home. You’ll tell 
him so, and shut the door.” 

So, it soon got whispered about, that Mr. Chester was 
very unfortunate in his son, who had occasioned him 
great grief •and sorrow. And the good people who 
heard this and told it again, marvelled the more at his 
equanimity and even temper, and said what an amiable 
nature that man must have, who, having undergone so 
much, could be so placid and so calm. And when Ed- 
ward’s name was spoken. Society shook its head and 
laid its finger on its lip, and sighed, and looked very 
grave ; and those who had sons about his age, waxed 
wrathful and indignant, and hoped, for Virtue’s sake, 
that he was dead. And the world went on turning 
round, as usual, for five years, concerning which this 
Narrative is silent. 


BAR NAB Y RUDGE. 


57 


CHAPTER XXXIIL 

1 

‘ One wintry evening, early in the year of our Lord 
one thousand seven hundred and eighty, a keen north 
wind arose as it grew dark, and night came on with 
black and dismal looks. A bitter storm of sleet, sharp, 
dense, and icy-cold, swept the wet streets, and rattled on 
the trembling windows. Sign-boards, shaken past en- 
durance in their creaking frames, fell crashing on the 
pavement ; old tottering chimneys reeled and staggered 
in the blast ; and many a steeple rocked again that 
night, as though the earth were troubled. 

It was not a time for those who could by any means 
get light and warmth, to brave the fury of the weather. 
In coffee-houses of the better sort, guests crowded round 
the fire, forgot to be political, and told each other with a 
secret gladness that the blast grew fiercer every minute. 
Each humble tavern by the water-side had its group of 
uncouth figures round the hearth ; who talked of vessels 
foundering at sea, and all hands lost, related many a 
dismal tale of shipwreck and drowned men, and hoped 
that some they knew were safe, and shook their heads in 
doubt. In private dwellings, children clustered near the 
blaze ; listening with timid pleasure to tales of ghosts 
and goblins and tall figures clad in white standing by 
bedsides, and people who had gone to sleep in old 
churches and being overlooked had found themselves 
alone there at the dead hour of the night ; until they 


58 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


shuddered at the thought of the dark rooms up-stairs, 
yet loved to hear the wind moan too, and hoped it would 
continue bravely. From time to time these happy in- 
door people stopped to listen, or one held up his finger 
and cried “ Hark ! ” and then, above the rumbling in the 
chimney, and the fast pattering on the glass, was heard a 
wailing, rushing sound, which shook the walls as though 
a giant’s hand were on them ; then a hoarse roar as if 
the sea had risen ; then such a whirl and tumult that the 
air seemed mad ; and then, with a lengthened howl, the 
waves of wind swept on, and left a moment’s interval of 
rest. 

Cheerily, though there were none abroad to see it, 
shone the Maypole light that evening. Blessings on 
the red — deep, ruby, glowing red — old curtain of the 
window ; blending into one rich stream of brightness, 
fire and candle, meat, drink, and company, and gleam- 
ing like a jovial eye upon the bleak waste out of doors ! 
Within, what carpet like its crunching sand, what music 
merry as its crackling logs, what perfume like its kitch- 
en’s dainty breath, what weather genial as its hearty 
warmth ! Blessings on the old house, how sturdily it 
stood ! How did the vexed wind chafe and roar about 
its stalwart roof ; how did it pant and strive with its 
wide chimneys, which still poured forth from their hos- 
pitable throats, great clouds of smoke, and puffed defi- 
ince in its face ; how, above all, did it drive and rattle 
at the casement, emulous to extinguish that cheerful 
glow, which would not be put down and seemed the 
brighter for the conflict. 

The profusion too, the rich and lavish bounty, of 
that goodly tavern ! It was not enough that one fire 
•'oared and sparkled on its spacious hearth ; in the tiles 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


59 


which paved and compassed it, five hundred flickering 
fires burnt brightly also. It was not enough that one 
red curtain shut the wild night out, and shed its cheerful 
influence on the room. In every saucepan lid and candle- 
stick, and vessel of copper, brass, or tin that hung upon 
the walls, were countless ruddy hangings, flashing and 
gleaming with every motion of the blaze, and offering, 
let the eye wander where it might, interminable vistas 
of the same rich color. The old oak wainscoting, the 
beams, the chairs, the seats, reflected it in a deep dull 
glimmer. There were fires and red curtains in the 
very eyes of the drinkers, in their buttons, in their 
liquor, in the pipes they smoked. 

Mr. Willet sat in what had been his accustomed 
place five years before, with his eyes on the eternal 
boiler ; and had sat there since the clock struck eight, 
giving no other signs of life than breathing with a 
loud and constant snore (though he was wide awake), 
and from time to time putting his glass to his lips, or 
knocking the ashes out of his pipe, and filling it anew. 
It was now half-past ten. • Mr. Cobb and long Phil 
Parkes were his companions, as of old, and for two 
mortal hours and a half, none of the company had 
pronounced one word. 

Whether people, by dint of sitting together in the 
same place and the same relative positions, and doing 
exactly the same things for a great many years, acquire 
a sixth sense, or some unknown power of influencing 
each other wdiich serves them in its stead, is a question 
Sur philosophy to settle. But certain it is that old John 
Willet, Mr. Parkes, and Mr. Cobb, were one and all 
firmly of opinion that they were very jolly companions 
— rather choice spirits than otherwise ; that they looked 


60 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


at each other every now and then as if there were a 
perpetual interchange of ideas going on among them ; 
that no man considered himself or his neighbor by any 
means silent ; and that each of them nodded occasion- 
ally when he caught the eye of another, as if he would 
say, “You have expressed yourself extremely well, sir, 
in relation to that sentiment, and I quite agree with 
you.” 

The room was so very warm, the tobacco so very 
good, and the fire so very soothing, that Mr. Willet by 
degrees began to doze ; but as he had perfectly acquired, 
by dint of long habit, the art of smoking in his sleep, 
and as his breathing was pretty much the same, awake 
or asleep, saving that in the latter case he sometimos 
experienced a slight difficulty in respiration (such as a 
carpenter meets with when he is planing and comes to 
a knot), neither of his companions was aware of the 
circumstance, until he met with one of these impedi- 
ments and was obliged to try again. 

“ Johnny’s dropped off,” said Mr. Parkes in a whis- 
per. 

“ Fast as a top,” said Mr. Cobb. 

Neither of them said any more until Mr. Willet came 
to another knot — one of surpassing obduracy — \vhich 
bade fair to throw him into convulsions, but which he 
got over at last without waking, by an effort quite 
superhuman. 

“ He sleeps uncommon hard,” said Mr. Cobb. 

Mr. Parkes, who was possibly a hard-sleeper himself, 
replied with some disdain, “ Not a bit on it ; ” and di- 
rected his eyes towards a handbill pasted over the 
chimney-piece, which was decorated at the top with a 
wood-cut representing a youth of tender years running 


BAKNABY RUDGE. 


61 


away very fast, with a bundle over his shoulder at the 
end of a stick, and — to carry out the idea — a finger- 
post and a mile-stone beside him. Mr. Cobb likewise 
turned his eyes in the same direction, and surveyed the 
placard as if that were the first time he had ever be- 
held it. Now, this was a document which Mr. Willet 
had himself indited on the disappearance of his son 
Joseph, acquainting the nobility and gentry and the 
public in general with the circumstances of his having 
left his home ; describing his dress and appearance ; 
and offering a reward of five pounds to any person or 
persons who would pack him up and return him safely 
to the Maypole at Chigwell, or lodge him in any of his 
Majesty’s jails until such time as his father should come 
and claim him. In this advertisement Mr. Willet had 
obstinately persisted, despite the advice and entreaties 
of his friends, in describing his son as a “young boy;” 
and furthermore as being from eighteen inches to a 
couple of feet shorter than he really was ; two circum- 
stances which perhaps accounted, in S^me degree, for its 
never having been. productive of any other effect than 
the transmission to Chigwell at various times and at a 
vast expense, of some five-and-forty runaways varying 
from six years old to twelve. 

Mr. Cobb and Mr. Parkes looked mysteriously at this 
composition, at each other, and at old John. From the 
time he had pasted it up with his own hands, Mr. Willed 
had never by word or sign alluded to the subject, or 
encouraged any one else to do so. Nobody had the 
least notion what his thoughts or opinions were, con- 
nected wdth it ; whether he remembered it or forgot 
it; whether he had any idea that such an event had 
ever taken place. Therefore, even while he slept, no 


62 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


one ventured to refer to it in his presence ; and for 
such sufficient reasons, these his chosen friends were 
silent now. 

Mr. Willet had got by this time into such a compli- 
cation of knots, that it was perfectly clear he must wake 
or die. He chose the former alternative, and opened his 
eyes. 

“ If he don’t come in five minutes,” said John, “ I 
shall have supper without him.” 

The antecedent of this pronoun had been mentioned 
for the last time at eight o’clock. Messrs. Parkes and 
Cobb being used to this style of conversation, replied 
without difficulty that to be sure Solomon was very 
late and they wondered what had happened to detain 
him. 

“He a’n’t blown away, I suppose,” said Parkes. “It’s 
enough to carry a man of his figure off his legs, and 
easy too. Do you hear it ? It blows great guns, in- 
deed. There’ll be many a crash in the Forest to-night, 
I reckon, and man^ a broken branch upon the ground 
to-morrow.” 

“ It won’t break anything in the Maypole, I take it, 
sir,” returned old John. “ Let it try. I give it leave — 
what’s that ? ” 

- “ The wind,” cried Parkes. “ It’s howling like a 
Christian, and has been all night long.” 

“ Did you ever, sir,” asked John, after a minute’s 
’ontemplation, “ hear the wind say ‘ Maypole ’ ? ” 

“ Why, what man ever did ? ” said Parkes. 

“ Nor ‘ ahoy,’ perhaps ? ” added John. | 

“ No. Nor that neither.” 

“ Very good, sir,” said Mr. Willet, perfectly unmoved ; 

then if that was the wind just now, and you’ll wait a 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


63 


little time without speaking, you’ll hear it say both words 
very plain.”. 

Mr. Willet was right. After listening for a few mo- 
ments, they could clearly hear, above the roar and tu- 
mult out of doors, this shout repeated ; and that with 
a shrillness and energy, which denoted that it came from 
some person in great distress or terror. They looked 
at each other, turned pale, and held their breath. No 
man stirred. 

It was in this emergency that Mr. Willet displayed 
something of that strength of mind and plenitude of 
mental resource, which rendered him the admiration 
of all his friends and neighbors. After looking at 
Messrs. Parkes and Cobb for some time in silence, he 
clapped his two hands to his cheeks, and sent forth a 
roar which made the glasses dance and rafters ring — 
a long-sustained, discordant bellow, that rolled onward 
with the wind, and startling every echo, made the night 
a hundred times more boisterous — a deep, loud, dismal 
bray, that sounded like a human gong. Then, with 
every vein in his head and face swollen with the great 
exertion, and his countenance suffused with a lively pur- 
ple, he drew a little nearer to the fire, and turning his 
back upon it, said with dignity : — 

“ If that’s any comfort to anybody, they’re welcome 
to it. If it a’n’t, I’m sorry for ’em. If either of you 
two gentlemen likes to go out and see what’s the mat 
er, you can. I’m not curious, myself.” 

Whi%5 he spoke the cry drew nearer and nearer, 
^ootsteps passed the window, the latch of the door was 
raised, it opened, was violently shut again, and Solo- 
mon Daisy, with a lighted lantern in his hand, and the 
••ain streaming from his disordered dress, dashed into 
the room. 


64 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


A more complete picture of terror than the little man 
presented, it would be difficult to imagine. The perspi- 
ration stood in beads upon his face, his knees knocked 
together, his every limb trembled, the power of articula- 
tion was quite gone ; and there he stood, panting for 
breath, gazing on them with such livid ashy looks, that 
they were infected with his fear, though ignorant of its 
occasion, and, reflecting his dismayed and horror-stricken 
visage, stared back again without venturing to question 
him ; until old John Willet, in a fit of temporary insanity, 
made a dive at his cravat, and, seizing him by that por- 
tion of his dress, shook him to and fro until his very 
teeth appeared to rattle in his head. 

“Tell us what’s the matter, sir,” said John, “or I’ll 
kill you. Tell us what’s the matter, sir, or in another 
second. I’ll have your head under the biler. How dare 
you look like that ? Is anybody a-following of you ? 
What do you mean ? Say something, or I’ll be the 
death of you, I will.” 

Mr. Willet, in his frenzy, was so near keeping his 
word to the very letter (Solomon Daisy’s eyes already 
beginning to roll in an alarming manner, and certain 
guttural sounds, as of a choking man, to issue from his 
throat), that the two by-standers, recovering in some 
degree, plucked him off his victim by main force, and 
placed the little clerk of Chigwell in a chair. Directing 
a fearful gaze all round the room, he implored them in a 
faint voice to give him some drink ; and above all to 
lock the house-door and close and bar the shutte/f of the 
room, without a moment’s loss of time. The latter re- 
quest did not tend to reassure his hearers, or to fill them 
with the most comfortable sensations ; they complied with 
it, how'ever, with the greatest expedition ; and having 


BARNABY RUDGE. • 


6o 


handed him a bumper of brandy-and-water, nearly boil- 
ing hot, waited to hear what he might have to tell them. 

“ Oh, Johnny,” said Solomon, shaking him by the 
hand. “Oh, Parkes. Oh, Tommy Cobb. Why did 
I leave this house to-night ! On the nineteenth of 
March — of all nights in the year, on the nineteenth 
of March ! ” 

They all drew closer to the fire. Parkes, who was 
nearest to the door, started and looked over his shoulder. 
Mr. Willet, with great indignation, inquired what the 
devil he meant by that — and then said, “ God forgive 
me,” and glanced over his own shoulder, and came a 
little nearer. 

“ When I left here to-night,” said Solomon Daisy, “ I 
little thought what day of the month it was. I have 
never gone alone into the church after dark on this day, 
for seven-and-twenty years. I have heard it said that 
as we keep our birthdays when we are alive, so the 
ghosts of dead people, who are not easy in their graves, 
keep the day they died upon. — How the wind roars ! ” 

Nobody spoke. All eyes were fastened on Solomon. 

“ I might have known,” he said, “ what night it was, 
by the foul weather. There’s no such night in the whole 
year round as this is, always. I never sleep quietly in 
my bed on the nineteenth of March.” 

“ Go on,” said Tom Cobb, in a low voice. “ Nor I 
either.” 

Solomon Daisy raised his glass to his lips ; put it 
down upon the floor with such a trembling hand that 
the spoon tinkled in it like a little bell ; and continued 
thus : — 

“ Have I ever said that we are always brought back 
to this subject in some strange way, when the nineteenth 
5 


VOL. II. 


66 


. BARNABY RUDGE. 


of this month comes round ? Do you suppose it was by 
accident, 1 forgot to wind up the church-clock ? I never 
forgot it at any other time, though it’s such a clumsy 
thing tliat it has to be wound up every day. Why 
should it escape my memory on this day of all others? 

“ I made as much haste down there as I could when I 
went from here, but I had to go home first for the keys ; 
and the wind and rain being dead against me all the 
way, it was pretty well as much as I could do at times to 
keep my legs. I got there at last, opened the church- 
door, and went in. I had not met a soul all the way, 
and you may judge whether it was dull or not. Neither 
of you would bear me company. If you could have 
known what was to come, you’d have been in the right. 

“ The wind was so strong, that it was as much as I 
could do to shut the church-door by putting my whole 
weight against it ; and even as it was, it burst wide open 
twice, with such strength that any of you would have 
sworn, if you had been leaning against it, as I was, that 
somebody was pushing on the other side. However, I 
got the key turned, went into the belfry, and wound up 
the clock — which was very near run down, and would 
have stood stock-still in half an hour. 

“ As I took up my lanteim again to leave the church, 
it came upon me all at once that this was the nineteenth 
of March. It came upon me with a kind of shock, as if 
a hand had struck the thought upon my forehead ; at the 
very same moment, I heard a voice outside the tower — 
rising from among the graves.” 

Plere old John precipitately interrupted the speaker, 
and begged that if Mr. Parkes (who was seated opposite 
to him and was staring directly over his head) saw any- 
thing, he would have the goodness to mention it. Mr 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


G7 


Parkes apologized, and remarked that he was only lis- 
tening; to which Mr. Willet angrily retorted, that his 
listening with that kind of expression in his face was not 
agreeable, and that if he couldn’t look like other people, 
he had better put his pocket-handkerchief over his head. 
Mr. Parkes with great submission pledged hhnself to do 
so, if again required, and John Willet turning to Solomon 
desired him to proceed. After waiting until a violent 
gust of wind and rain, which seemed to shake even that 
sturdy house to its foundation, had passed away, the little 
man complied : — 

“ Never tell me that it was my fancy, or that it was 
any other sound which I mistook for that I tell you of. 
I heard the wind whistle through the arches of the 
church. I heard the steeple strain and creak. I heard 
the rain as it came driving against the walls. I felt the 
bells shake. I saw the ropes sway to and fro. And I 
heard that voice.” 

“ What did it say ? ” asked Tom Cobb. 

“ I don’t know what ; I don’t know that it spoke. It 
gave a kind of cry, as any one of us might do, if some- 
thing dreadful followed us in a dream, and came upon us 
unawares ; and then it died olF : seeming to pass quite 
round the church.” 

“ I don’t see much in that,” said John, drawing a long 
breath, and looking round him like a man who felt re- 
lieved. 

“ Perhaps not,” returned his friend, “ but that’s no 
all.’’ 

“ What more do you mean to say, sir, is to come ? 
asked John, pausing in the act of wiping his face upon 
his apron. “ AVhat are you a-going to tell us of next ? ” 

“ What I saw.” 


68 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ Saw ! ” echoed all three, bending forward. 

“ When I opened the church-door to come out,” said 
the little man, with an expression of face which bore 
ample testimony to the sincerity of his conviction, ‘‘when 
I opened the church-door to come out, which I did sud- 
denly, for I 'Wanted to get it shut again before another 
gust of wind came up, there crossed me — so close, that 
by stretching out my finger I could have touched it — 
something in the likeness of a man. It was bare-headed 
to the storm. It turned its face without stopping, and 
fixed its eyes on mine. It was a ghost — a spirit.” 

“ Whose ? ” they all three cried together. 

In the excess of his emotion (for he fell back trem- 
bling in his cliair, and waved his hand as if entreating 
them to question him no further,) his answer was lost on 
all but old John Willet, who happened to be seated close 
beside him. 

“ Who ! ” cried Parkes and Tom Cobb, looking eagerly 
by turns at Solomon Daisy and at Mr. Willet. “ Who 
was it?” 

“ Gentlemen,” said Mr. Willet after a long pause, 
“ you needn’t ask. The likeness of a murdered man. 
I'his is the nineteenth of March.” 

A profound silence ensued. 

“ If you’ll take my advice,” said John, “ we had 
better, one and all, keep this a secret. Such tales 
would not be liked at the Warren. Let us keep i 
to ourselves for the present time at all events, or we 
may get into trouble, and Solomon may lose his place. 
Whether it was really as he says, or whether it wasn’t, 
is no matter. Right or wrong, nobody would believe 
him. As (o the probabilities, I don’t myself think,” 
said Mr. Willet, eying the corners of the room in 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


69 


a manner which showed that, like some other philoso- 
phers, he was not quite easy in his theory, “ that a 
ghost as had been a man of sense in his lifetime, 
would be out a- walking in such weather — I only know 
that / wouldn’t, if I was one.” 

But this heretical doctrine was strongly opposed by 
the other three, who quoted a great many precedents 
to show that bad weather was the very time for such 
appearances ; and Mr. Parkes (who had had a ghost 
in his family, by the mother’s side) argued the matter 
with so much ingenuity and force of illustration, that 
John was only saved from having to retract his opinion 
by the opportune appearance of supper, to which they 
applied themselves with a dreadful relish. Even Solo- 
mon Daisy himself, by dint of the elevating influences 
of fire, lights, brandy, and good company, so far re- 
covered as to handle his knife and fork in a highly 
creditable manner, and to display a capacity both of 
eating and drinking, such as banished all fear of his 
having sustained any lasting injury from his fright. 

Supper done, they crowded round the fire again, and, 
as is common on such occasions, propounded all manner 
of leading questions calculated to surround the story 
with new horrors and surprises. But Solomon Daisy, 
notwithstanding these temptations, adhered so steadily 
to his original account, and repeated it so often, with 
such slight variations, and with such solemn assevera- 
tions of its truth and reality, that his hearers were (with 
good reason) more astonished than at first. As he took 
John Willet’s view of the matter in regard to the pro- 
priety of not bruiting the’ tale abroad, unless the spirit 
should a{)pear to him again, in which case it would be 
necessary to take immediate counsel with the clergyman, 


70 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


it was solemnly resolved that it should be hushed up and 
kept quiet. And as most men like to have a secret to 
tell which may exalt their own importance, they arrived 
at' this conclusion with perfect unanimity. 

As it was by this time growing late, and was long past 
their usual hour of separating, the cronies parted for the 
night. Solomon Daisy, with a fresh candle in his lan- 
tern, repaired homewards under the escort of long Phil 
Parkes and Mr. Cobb, who were rather more nervous 
than himself. Mr. Willet, after seeing them to the door, 
returned to collect his thoughts with the assistance of the 
boiler, and to listen to the storm of wind and rain, which 
had not yet abated one jot of its fury. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


71 


CHAPTER XXXIV. 

Before old John had looked at the boiler quite twenty 
minutes, he got his ideas into a focus, and brought them 
to bear upon Solomon Daisy’s story. The more he 
thought of it, the more impressed he became with a 
sense of his own wisdom, and a desire that Mr. Haredale 
should be impressed with it likewise. At length, to the 
end that he might sustain a principal and important Char- 
acter in the affair ; and might have the start of Solomon 
and his two friends, through whose means he knew the 
adventure, with a variety of exaggerations, would be 
known to at least a score of people, and most likely to 
Mr. Haredale himself, by breakfast-time to-morrow ; he 
determined to repair to the Warren before going to bed. 

“He’s my landlord,” thought John, as he took a candle 
in his hand, and setting it down in a corner out of the 
wind’s way, opened a casement in the rear of the house, 
looking towards the stables. “We haven’t met of late 
years so often as we used to do — changes are taking 
place in the family — it’s desirable that I should stand 
as well with them, in point of dignity, as possible — the 
whispering about of this here tale will anger him — it’s 
^ood to have confidences with a gentleman of his naturi, 
and set one’s self right besides. Halloa there ! Hugh 
— Hugh. Hal-loa!” 

When he had repeated this shout a dozen times, and 
startled every pigeon from its slumbers, a dooi’ in one of 


72 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


the ruinous old buildings opened, and a rough voice de- 
manded what was amiss now, that a man couldn’t even 
have his sleep in quiet. 

“ What ! Haven’t you sleep enough, growler, that 
you’re not to be knocked up for once ? ” said John. 

“ No,” replied the voice, as the speaker yawned and 
shook himself. “Not half enough.” 

“ I don’t know how you can sleep, with the wind a- 
bellowsing and roaring about you, making the tiles fly 
like a pack of cards,” said John ; “ but no matter for 
that. Wrap- yourself up in something or another, and 
come here, for you must go as far as the Warren with 
me. And look sharp about it.” 

Hugh, with much low growling and muttering, went 
back into his lair ; and presently reappeared, carrying a 
lantern and a cudgel, and enveloped from head to foot, 
in an old, frowzy, slouching horse-cloth. Mr. Willet 
received this figure at the back-door, and ushered him 
into the bar, while he wrapped himself in sundry great- 
coats and capes, and so tied and knotted his face in 
shawls and handkerchiefs, that how he breathed was a 
mystery. 

“ You don’t take a man out of doors at near midnight 
in such weather, without putting some heart into him, do 
you, master ? ” said Hugh. 

“Yes I do, sir,” returned Mr. Willet. “I put the 
heart (as you call it) into him when he has brought me 
Biife home again, and his standing steady on his legs a’n’t 
cf so much consequence. So hold that light up, if you 
please, and go on a step or two before to sliow the way.” 

Hugh obeyed with a very indifferent grace, and a 
longing glance at the bottles. Old John, laying strict 
hijunctions on his cook to keep the doors locked in his 


BARNABY RUDGE, 


73 


absence, and to open to nobody but himself on pain of 
dismissal, followed him into the blustering darkness out 
of doors. 

The way was wet and dismal, and the night so black, 
that if Mr. Willet had been his own pilot, he would have 
walked into a deep horse-pond within a few hundred 
yards of his own house, and would certainly have termi- 
nated his career in that ignoble sphere of action. But 
Hugh, who had a sight as keen as any hawk’s, and, 
apart from that endowment, could have found his way 
blindfold to any place within a dozen miles, dragged old 
John along, quite deaf to his remonstrances, and took his 
own course without the slightest reference to, or notice 
of, his master. So they made head against the wind as 
they best could ; Hugh crushing the wet grass beneath 
his heavy tread, and stalking on after his ordinary sav- 
age fashion ; John Willet following at arm’s length, 
picking his steps, and looking about him, now for bogs 
• and ditches, and now for such stray ghosts as might be 
wandering abroad, with looks of as much dismay and 
uneasiness as his immovable face was capable of ex- 
pressing. 

At length they stood upon the broad gravel-walk«, be- 
fore the Warren-house. The building was profoundly 
dark, and none were moving near it save themselves 
From one solitary turret-chamber, however, there shone 
ray of light ; and towards this speck of comfort in the 
•old, cheerless silent scene, Mr. Willet bade his pilot 
‘ead him. 

“ The old room,” said John, looking timidly upward ; 
‘ Mr. Reuben’s own apartment, -God be with us ! I won- 
der his brother likes to sit there, so late at night — on 
this night too.” 


74 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ Why, where else should he sit ? ” asked Hugh, hold* 
ing the lantern to his breast, to keep the candle from the 
wind, while he trimmed it with his fingers. “ It’s snug 
enough, a’n’t it ? ” 

“ Snug ! ” said John indignantly. “ You have a com- 
fortable idea of snugness, you have, sir. Do you know 
what was done in that room, you ruffian ? ” 

“ Why, what is it the worse for that ! ” cried Hugh, 
looking into John’s fat face. “ Does it keep out the rain, 
and snow, and wind, the less for that ? Is it less warm 
or dry, because a man was killed there ? Ha, ha, ha ! 
Never believe it, master. One man’s no such matter as 
that comes to.” 

Mr. Willet fixed his dull eyes on his follower, and 
began — by a species of inspiration — to think it just 
barely possible that' he was something of a dangerous 
character, and that it might be advisable to get rid of 
him one of these days. He was too prudent to say any- 
thing, with the journey home before him ; and therefore' 
turned to the iron gate before which this brief dialogue 
had passed, and pulled the handle of the bell that hung 
beside it. The turret in which the light appeared being 
at one corner of the building, and only divided from the 
path by one of the garden-walks, upon which this gate 
opened, Mr. Haredale threw up the window directly, 
and demanded who was there. 

“ Begging pardon, sir,” said John. “ I knew you sa 
up late, and made bold to come round, having a word to 
say to you.” 

“ Willet — is it not ? ” 

“ Of the Maypole — at your service, sir.” 

Mr. Haredale closed the window, and withdrew. He 
presently appeared at a door in the bottom of the turret, 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


75 


and coming across the garden- walk unlocked the gate 
and let them in. 

“ You are a late visitor, Willet. What is the mat- 
ter ? ” 

“ Nothing to speak of, sir,” said John ; “ an idle 
tale, I thought you ought to know of ; nothing more.” 

“ Let your man go forward with the lantern, and 
give me your hand. The stairs are crooked and nar- 
row. Gently wdth your light, friend. You swing it 
like a censer.” 

Hugh, who had already reached the turret, held it 
more steadily, and ascended first, turning round from 
time to time to shed its light downward on the steps. 
Mr. Haredale following next, eyed his lowering face 
with no great favor ; and Hugh, looking down on him, 
returned his glances with interest, as they climbed the 
winding stair. 

It terminated in a little anteroom adjoining that 
from which they had seen the light. Mr. Haredale 
entered first, and led the way through it into the lat- 
ter chamber, where he seated himself at a writing- 
table from which he had risen when they rang the 
bell. 

“ Come in,” he said, beckoning to old John, who 
remained bowing at the door. “ Not you, friend,” he 
added hastily to Hugh, who entered also. “ Willet, 
why do you bring that fellow here?” 

“ Why, sir,” returned John, elevating his eyebrows, 
and lowering his voice to the tone in which the ques* 
tion had been asked him, “ he^s a good guard, you 
see.” 

“ Don’t be too sure of that,” said Mr. Haredale, look- 
ing towards him as he spoke. “ I doubt it. He has an 
evil eye.” 


76 


BARNABY RUDGE. 




“ There’s no imagination in his eye,” returned Mr 
Willet, glancing over his shoulder at the organ in ques- 
tion, “ certainly.” 

“ There is no good there, be assured,” said Mr. Hare- 
dale. “ Wait in that little room, friend, and close the 
door between us.” 

Hugh shrugged his shoulders, and with a disdainful 
look, which showed, either that he had overheard, or 
that he guessed the purport of their whispering, did as 
he was told. When he was shut out, Mr. Haredale 
turned to John, and bade him- go on with what he had 
to say, but not to speak too loud, for there were quick 
ears yonder. 

Thus cautioned, Mr. Willet, in an oily whisper, recited 
all that he had heard and said that night ; laying par- 
ticular stress upon his own sagacity, upon his great 
regard for the family, and upon his solicitude for their 
peace of mind and happiness. The story moved his 
auditor much more than he had expected. Mr. JIare- 
dale often changed his attitude, rose and paced the room, 
returned again, desired him to repeat, as nearly as he 
could, the very words that Solomon had used, and gave 
so many other signs of being disturbed, and ill at ease, 
that even Mr. Willet was surprised. 

“ You did quite right,” he said, at the end of a long 
conversation, “ to bid them keep this story secret. It 
is a foolish fancy on the part of this weak-brained man, 
bred in his fears and superstition. But Miss Haredale, 
thoqgh she would know it to be so, would be disturbed 
by it if it reached her ears ; it is too nearly connected 
wilh a subject very painful to us all, to be lieard 
^ith indifference. You were most prudent, and have 
laid me under a great obligation. I thank you very 
much.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


7V 


This was equal to John’s most sanguine expecta 
lions ; but he would have preferred Mr. Haredale’s 
looking at him when he spoke, as if he really did 
thank him, to his walking up and down, speaking by 
fits and starts, often stopping with his eyes fixed on 
the ground, moving hurriedly on again, like one dis- 
tracted, and seeming almost unconscious of what he 
said or did. 

This, however, was his manner ; and it was so em- 
barrassing to John that he sat quite passive for a long 
time, not knowing what to do. At length he rose. Mr. 
Haredale stared at him for a moment as though he had 
quite forgotten his being present, then shook hands with 
him and opened the door. Hugh, who was, or feigned 
to be, fast asleep on the antechamber floor, sprang up 
on their entrance, and throwing his cloak about him, 
grasped his stick and lantern, and prepared to descend 
the stairs. 

“ Stay,” said Mr. Haredale. “ Will this man drink ? ” 
Drink ! He’d drink the Thames up, if it was 
strong enough, sir,” replied John Willet. He’ll have 
something when he gets home. He’s better without it, 
now, sir.” 

“ Nay. Half the distance is done,” said Hugh. 
“ What a hard master you are ! I shall go home the 
better for one glassful, half-way. Come ! ” 

As John made no reply, Mr. Haredale brought out 
a glass of liquor, and gave it to Hugh, who, as he 
took it in his hand, threw part of it upon the floor. 

“ What do you mean by splashing your drink about 
a gentleman’s house, sir ? ” said John. 

“ I’m drinking a toast,” Hugh rejoined, holding the 
glass above his head, and fixing his eyes on Mr. Hare- 


78 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


dale’s face ; “ a toast to this house and its master.” With 
that he muttered something to himself and drank the 
rest, and setting down the glass preceded them without 
another word. 

John was a good deal scandalized by this observance, 
but seeing that Mr. Haredale took little heed of what 
Hugh said or did, and that his thoughts were other- 
wise employed, he offered no apology, and went in 
silence down the stairs, across the walk, and through 
the garden-gate. They stopped upon the outer side 
for Hugh to hold the light while Mr. Haredale locked 
it on the inner ; and then John saw with wonder (as 
he often afterwards related), that he was very pale, and 
that his face had changed so much and grown so hag- 
gard since their entrance, that he almost seemed another 
man. 

They were in the open road again, and John Willet 
was walking on behind his escort, as he had come, 
thinking very steadily of what he had just now seen, 
when Hugh drew him suddenly aside, and almost at 
the same instant three horsemen swept past — the near- 
est brushed his shoulder even then — who, checking 
their steeds as suddenly as they could, stood still, and 
waited for their coming up. 


BAI^^^ABY RUDGE. 


79 


CHAPTER XXXV. 

When John Willet saw that the horsemen wheeled 
smartly round, and drew up three abreast in the narrow 
road, waiting for him and his man to join them, it oc- 
curred to him with unusual precipitation that they must' 
be highwaymen; and had Hugh been armed with a 
blunderbuss, in place of his stout cudgel, he would cer- 
tainly have ordered him to fire it off at a venture, and 
would, while the word of command was obeyed, have 
consulted his own personal safety in immediate flight. 
Under the circumstances of disadvantage, however, in 
which he and his guard were placed, he deemed it pru- 
dent to adopt a different style of generalship, and there- 
fore whispered' his attendant to address them in the most 
peaceable and courteous terms. By way of acting up 
to the spirit and letter of this instruction, Hugh stepped 
forward, and flourishing his staff before the very eyes 
of the rider nearest to him, demanded roughly what he 
and his fellows meant by so nearly galloping over them, 
nnd why they scoured the king’s highway at that late 
hour of night. 

The man whom he addressed was beginning an angry 
reply in the same strain, when he was checked by the 
horseman in the centre, who, interposing with an air of 
authority, inquired in a somewhat loud but not harsh or 
jnpleasant voice : — 

“ Pray, is this the London road ? ” 


BO 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ If you follow it right, it is,” replied Hugh roughly. 

Nay, brother,” said the same person, “ you’re but a 
churlish Englishman, if Englishman you be — which I 
should much doubt but for your tongue. Your compan- 
ion, I am sure, will answer me more civilly. How say 
you, friend?” 

“ I say it is the London road, sir,” answered John. 
“ And I wish,” he added in a subdued voice, as he 
turned to Hugh, “ that you was in any other road, you 
vagabond. Are you tired of your life, sir, that you go 
a-trying to provoke three great neck-or-nothing chaps, 
that could keep on running over us, back’ards and 
for’ards, till we was dead, and then take our bodies 
up behind ’em, and drown us ten miles off?” 

“ How far is it to London ? ” inquired the same 
speaker. 

“ Why, from here, sir,” answered John, persuasively, 
“ it’s thirteen very easy mile.” 

The adjective was thrown in, as an inducement to the 
travellers to ride away with all speed ; but instead of 
having the desired effect, it elicited from the same 
person, the remark, “ Thirteen miles ! That’s a long 
distance ! ” which was followed by a short pause of in- 
decision. 

“ Pray,” said the gentleman, “ are there any inns here- 
abouts ? ” 

At the word “ inns,” John plucked up his spirit in a 
surprising manner ; his fears rolled off like smoke ; all 
the landlord stirred within him. 

“ There are no inns,” rejoined Mr. Willet, with a 
strong emphasis on the plural number ; “ but there’s a 
Inn — one Inn — the Maypole Inn. That’s a Inn in- 
leed You won’t see the like of that Inn often.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


81 


You keep it perhaps ? ” said the horseman, smiling. 

“ I do, sir,” replied John, greatly wondering how he 
had found this out. 

“ And how far is the Maypole from here ? ” 

“ About a mile ” — John was going to add that it 
was the easiest mile in all the world, when the third 
rider, who had hitherto kept a little in the rear, sud- 
denly interposed : — 

And have you one excellent bed, landlord ? Hem ! 
A bed that you can recommend — a bed that you are 
sure if well aired — a bed that has been slept in by 
some perfectly respectable and unexceptionable per- 
son ! ” 

“ We don’t take in no tagrag and bobtail at our house, 
sir,” answered John. “ And as to the bed itself” — 

“ Say, as to three beds,” interposed the gentleman 
who had spoken before ; “ for we shall want three if 
we stay, though my friend only speaks of one.” 

“ No, no, my lord ; you are too good, you are too 
kind ; but your life is of far too much importance to the 
nation in these portentous times, to be placed upon a 
level with one so useless and so poor as mine. A great 
cause, my lord, a mighty cause, depends on you. You 
are its leader and its champion, its advanced guard and 
its van. It is the cause of our altars and our homes, 
our country and our faith. Let me sleep on a chair — 
the carpet — anywhere. No one will repine if I take 
cold or fever. Let John Gru’eby pass the night beneath 
the open sky — no one will repine for him. But forty 
thousand men of this our island in the wave (exclusive 
of women and children) rivet their eyes and thoughts on 
Lord George Gordon ; and every day, from the rising 
up of the sun to the going down of the same, pray for 

VOL. II. 6 


82 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


his health and vigor. My lord ” said the speaker, rising 
in his stirrups, “ it is a glorious cause, and must not be 
forgotten. My lord, it is a mighty cause, and must not 
be endangered. My lord, it is a holy cause, and must 
not be deserted.” 

“ It is a holy cause,” exclaimed his lordship, lifting up 
his hat with great solemnity. “ Amen ! ” 

“ John Grueby,” said the long-winded gentleman, in a 
tone of mild reproof, “ his lordship said Amen.” 

“ I heard my lord, sir,” said the man, sitting like a 
statue on his horse. 

“ And do not you say Amen, likewise ? ” 

To which John Grueby made no reply at all, but sat 
looking straight before him. 

“ You surprise me, Grueby,” said the gentleman. “ At 
a -crisis like the present, when Queen Elizabeth, that 
maiden monarch, weeps within her tomb, and Bloody 
Mary with a brow of gloom and shadow, stalks trium- 
phant ” — 

“ Oh, sir,” cried the man, gruffly, “ where’s the use of 
talking of Bloody Mary, under such circumstances as 
the present, when my lord’s wet through and tired with 
hard riding? Let’s either go on to London, sir, or 
put up at once ; or that unfort’nate Bloody Mary will 
have more to answer for — and she’s done a deal more 
harm in her grave than she ever did in her lifetime, 
I believe.” 

By this time Mr. Willet, who had never heard so 
many words spoken together at one time, or delivered 
with such volubility and emphasis as by the long-winded 
gentleman ; and whose brain, being wholly unable to 
sustain or compass them, had quite given itself up for 
lost; recovered so far as to observe that there was 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


8? 


ample accommodation at the Maypole for all the party : 
good beds ; neat wines ; excellent entertainment for man 
and beast ; private rooms for large or small parties ; din- 
ners dressed upon the shortest notice ; choice stabling, 
and a lock-up coach-house : and, in short, to run over 
such recommendatory scraps of language as were painted 
up on various portions of the building, and which, in the 
course of some forty years, he had learnt to repeat with 
tolerable correctness. He was considering whether it 
was at all possible to insert any novel sentences to the 
same purpose, when the gentleman who had spoken first, 
turning to him of the long wind, exclaimed, “ What say 
you, Gashford ? Shall we tarry at this house he speaks 
of, or press forward ? You shall decide.” 

“ I would submit, my lord, then,” returned the person 
he appealed to, in a silky tone, “ that your health and 
spirits — so important under Providence, to our great 
cause, our pure and truthful cause ” — here his lordship 
pulled off his hat again, though it was raining hard — 
“ require refreshment and repose.” 

“ Go on before, landlord, and show the way,” said 
Lord George Gordon ; “ we will follovy at a footpace.” 

“ If you’ll give me leave, my lord,” said John Grue- 
by, in a low voice, “ I’ll change my proper place, and 
ride before you. The looks of the landlord’s friend are 
not over honest, and it may be as well to be cautious 
with him.” 

“ John Grueby is quite right,” interposed Mr. Gash- 
ford, falling back hastily. “ My lord, a life so precious 
as yours must not be put in peril. Go forward, John, 
oy all means. If you have any reason to suspect the 
^llow, blow his brains out.” 

John made no answer, but looking straight before him, 


84 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


as his custom seemed to be when the secretary spoke^ 
l)ade Hugh push on, and followed close behind him. 
Then came his lordship, with Mr. Willet at his bridle 
rein ; and, last of all, his lordship’s secretary — for that, 
it seemed, was Gashford’s office. 

Hugh strode briskly on, often looking back at’ the 
servant, whose horse was close upon his heels, and 
glancing with a leer at his holster case of pistols, by 
which he seemed to set great store. He was a square- 
built, strong-made, bull-necked fellow, of the true Eng- 
lish breed ; and as Hugh measured him with his eye, 
he measured Hugh, regarding him meanwhile with a 
look of bluff disdain. He was much older than the May- 
pole man, being to all appearance five-and-forty ; but was 
one of those self-possessed, hard-headed, imperturbable 
fellows, who, if they ever are beat at fisticuffs, or other 
kind of warfare, never know it, and go on coolly till 
they win. 

“If I led you wrong now,” said Hugh, tauntingly, 
“ you’d — ha, ha, ha ! — you’d shoot me through the 
head, I suppose.” 

John Grueby took no more notice of this remark 
than if he had been deaf and Hugh dumb ; but kept 
riding on, quite comfortably, with his eyes fixed on the 
horizon. 

“ Did you ever try a fall with a man when you were 
young, master ? ” said Hugh. “ Can you make any play 
at singlestick ? ” v 

John Grueby looked at him sideways with the same 
contented air, but deigned not a word in answer. 

— “ Like this ? ” said Hugh, giving his cudgel one of 
those skilful flourishes, in which the rustic of that time 
delighted. “ Whoop ! ” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


85 


— Or that,” returned John Grueby, beating down 
his guard with his whip, and striking him on the head 
with its butt end. “Yes, I played a little once. You 
wear your hair too long; I should have cracked your 
crown if it had been a little shorter.” 

It was a pretty smart, loud-sounding rap as it was, 
and evidently astonished Hugh ; who, for the moment 
seemed disposed to drag his new acquaintance from his 
saddle. But hi« face betokening neither malice, triumph, 
rage, nor any lingering idea that he had given him of- 
fence ; his eyes gazing steadily in the old direction, and 
his manner being as careless and composed as if he had 
merely brushed away a fly ; Huhh was so puzzled, and 
so disposed to look upon him as a customer of almost 
supernatural* toughness, that he merely laughed, and 
cried “ Well done ! ” then, sheering off a little, led the 
way in silence. 

Before the lapse of many minutes . the party halted 
at the Maypole door. Lord George and his secretary 
quickly dismounting, gave their horses to their servant, 
who, under the guidance of Hugh, repaired to the sta- 
bles. Right glad to escape from the inclemency of the 
night, they followed Mr. Willet into the common room, 
and stood warming themselves and drying their clothes 
before the cheerful fire, while he busied himself with 
such orders and preparations as his guest’s high quality 
required. 

As he bustled in and out of the room, intent on these 
arrangements, he had an opportunity of observing the 
two travellers, of whom, as yet, he knew nothing but the 
7oice. The lord, the great personage, who did the May- 
pole so much honor, was about the middle height, of a 
slender make, and sallow complexion, with an aquiline 


86 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


nose and long hair of a reddish brown, combed perfectly 
straight and smooth about his ears, and slightly pow- 
dered, but without the faintest vestige of a curl. He 
was attired, under his great coat, in a full suit of black, 
quite free from any ornament, and of the most precise 
and sober cut. The gravity of his dress, together with 
a certain lankness of cheek and stiffness of deportment, 
added nearly ten years to his age, but his figure was that 
of one not yet past thirty. As he stood musing, in the 
red glow of the fire, it was striking to observe his very 
bright large eye, which betrayed a restlessness of thought 
and purpose, singularly at variance with the studied com- 
posure and sobriety of iiis mien, and with his quaint and 
sad apparel. It had nothing harsh or cruel in its expres- 
sion ; neither had his face, which was thin and mild, and 
wore an air of melancholy ; but it was suggestive of an 
indefinable uneasiness, which infected those who looked 
upon him, and filled them with a kind of pity for the 
man : though why it did so, they would have had some 
trouble to explain. 

Gashford, the secretary, was taller, angularly made, 
high-shouldered, bony, and ungraceful. His dress, in 
imitation of his superior, was demure and staid in the 
extreme ; his manner, formal and constrained. This 
gentleman had an overhanging brow, great hands and 
feet and ears, and a pair of eyes that seemed to have 
made an unnatural retreat into his head, and to have dug 
themselves a cave to hide in. His manner was smooth 
and humble, but very sly and slinking. He wore the 
aspect of a man who was always lying in wait for some- 
thing that wouldnH come to pass ; but he looked patient 
i — very patient — and fawned like a spaniel dog. Even 
now, while he warmed and rubbed his hands before the 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


87 


blaze, he had the air of one who only presumed to enjoy 
it in his degree as a commoner ; and tliough he knew his 
lord was not regarding him, he looked into his face from 
time to time, and, with a meek and deferential manner, 
smiled as if for practice. 

Such were tlie guests whom old John Willet, with a 
fixed and leaden eye, surveyed a hundred times, and to 
whom he now advanced, with a state candlestick in each 
hand, beseeching them to follow him into a worthier 
chamber. “ For my lord,” said John — it is odd enough 
but certain people seem to have as great a pleasure in 
pronouncing titles as their' owners have in wearing them 
— “ this room, my lord, isn’t at all the sort of place for 
your lordship, and I have to beg your lordship’s pardon 
for keeping you here, my lord, one minute.” 

With this address, John ushered them up-stairs into 
the state apartment, which, like many other things of 
state, was cold and comfortless. Their own footsteps, re- 
verberating through the spacious room, struck upon their 
hearing with a hollow sound ; and its damp and chilly 
atmosphere was rendered doubly cheerless by contrast 
with the homely warmth they had deserted. 

It was of no use, however, to propose a return to the 
place they had quitted, for the preparations went on so 
briskly that there was no time to stop them. John, with 
the tall candlesticks in his hands, bowed them up to the 
fireplace; Hugh, striding in with a lighted brand and 
pile of tire-wood, cast it down upon the hearth, and set 
!t in a blaze ; John Grueby (who had a great blue cock- 
ade in his hat, which he appeared to despise mightily) 
brought in the portmanteau lie had carried on his horse, 
and placed it on the floor ; and presently all three were 
busily engaged in drawing out the screen, laying the 


88 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


cloth, inspecting the beds, lighting fires in the bedrooms, 
expediting the supper, and making everything as cosey 
and as snug as might be, on so short a notice. In less 
than an hour’s time, supper had been served, and ate, 
and cleared away ; and Lord George and his secretary 
with slippered feet and legs stretched out before the fire, 
sat over some hot mulled wine together. 

“ So ends, my lord,” said Gashford, filling his glass 
with great complacency, “ the blessed work of a most 
blessed day.” 

“ And of a blessed yesterday,” said his lordship, rais- 
ing his head. 

“ Ah ! ” — and here the secretary clasped his hands — 
“ a blessed yesterday indeed ! The Protestants of Suf- 
folk are godly men and true. Though others of our 
countrymen have lost their way in darkness, even as 
we, my lord, did lose our road to-night, theirs is the light 
and glory.” 

“ Did I move them, Gashford ? ” said Lord George. 

“ Move them, my lord ! Move them ! They cried to 
be led on against the Papists, they vowed a dreadful 
vengeance on their heads, they roared like men pos- 
sessed ” — 

“ But not by devils,” said his lord. 

“ By devils ! my lord ! By angels.” 

“Yes — oh surely — by angels, no doubt,” said Lord 
George, thrusting his hands into his pockets, taking them 
out again to bite his nails, and looking uncomfortably at 
the fire. “ Of course by angels — eh Gashford ? ” 

“ You do not doubt it, my lord ? ” said the secretary. 

“ No — No,” returned his lord. “ No. Why should 
I ? I suppose it would be decidedly irreligious to doubt 
it — wouldn’t it, Gashford ? Though there certainly 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


80 


were,” he added, without waiting for an ans tver, “ some 
plaguy ill-looking characters among them.” 

“ When you warmed,” said the secretary, looking 
sharply at the other’s downcast eyes, which brightened 
slowly as he spoke ; “ when you warmed into that noble 
outbreak : when you told them that you were never of 
the lukewarm or the timid tribe, and bade them take 
heed that they were prepared to follow one who would 
lead them on, though to the very death; when you spoke 
of a hundred and twenty thousand men across the Scot- 
tish border who would take their own redress at any 
time, if it were not conceded ; when you cried ‘ Perish 
the Pope and all his base adherents ; the penal laws 
against them shall never be repealed while Englishmen 
have hearts and hands ’ — and waved your own and 
touched your sword ; and when they cried ‘ No Ppp- 
ery ! ’ and you cried ^ No ; not even if we wade in blood,’ 
and they threw up their hats and cried ‘ Hurrah ! not 
even if we wade in blood ; No Popery ! Lord George ! 
Down with the Papists — Vengeance on their heads;* 
when this was said and done, and a word from you, my 
lord, could raise or still the tumult — ah ! then I felt 
what greatness was indeed, and thought. When was 
there ever power like this of Lord George Gordon’s ! ” 
It’s a great power. You’re right. It is a great 
power ! ” he cried with sparkling eyes. “ But — dear 
Gashford — did I really say all that ? ” 

“ And how much more ! ” cried the secretary, looking 
upwards. “ Ah ! how much more ! ” 

“ And I told them what you say, about the one hun- 
dred and forty thousand men in Scotland, did I ! ” he 
asked with evident delight. “ That was bold.” 

“ Our cause is boldness. Truth is always bold.” 


90 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ Certainly. So’s religion. She’s bold, Gashford ? ” 

“ The true religion is, my lord.” 

“ And that’s ours,” he rejoined, moving uneasily in his 
Beat, and biting his nails as though he would pare them 
to the quick. “ There can be no doubt of ours being 
the true one. You feel as certain of that as I do Gash- 
ford, don’t you ? ” 

“ Does my lord ask we,” whined Gashford, drawing hia 
chair nearer with an injured air, and laying his broad 
flat hand upon the table; “we,” he repealed, bending the 
dark hollows of his eyes upon him with an unwholesome 
smile, “ who, stricken by the magic of his eloquence in 
Scotland but a year ago, abjured the errors of the Rom- 
ish church, and clung to him as one whose timely hand 
had plucked me from a pit ? ” 

“ True. No — No. I — I didn’t mean it,” replied 
the other, shaking him by the hand, rising from his 
seat, and pacing restlessly about the room. “ It’s a 
proud thing to lead the people, Gashford,” he added 
as he made a sudden halt. 

“By force of reason too,” returned the pliant secre- 
tary. 

“ Ay, to be sure. They may cough, and jeer, and 
groan in Parliament, and call me fool and madman, but 
which of them can raise this human sea and make it 
swell and roar at pleasure ? Not one.” 

“ No one,” repeated Gashford. ’ 

“ Which of them can say for his honesty, what I can 
say for mine ; which of them has refused a minister’s 
bribe of one thousand pounds a year, to resign his seat 
in favor of another ? Not one.” 

“ Not one,” repeated Gashford again — taking the 
lion’s share of the mulled wine between whiles. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


91 


“ And as we are honest, true, and in a sacred cause, 
Gashford,” said Lord George with a heightened color 
and in a louder voice, as he laid his fevered hand upon 
his shoulder, “and are the only men who regard the mass 
of people out of doors, or are regarded by them, we will 
uphold them to the last ; and will raise a cry against 
these un-English Papists which shall reecho through 
the country, and roll with a noise like thunder. I will 
be worthy of the motto on my coat of arms, ‘ Called 
and chosen and faithful.’ ” 

“ Called,’* said the secretary, “ by Heaven.” 

“ I am.” 

“ Chosen by the people.” 

« Yes.” 

“ Faithful to both.” 

“ To the block ! ” 

It would be difficult to convey an adequate idea of the 
excited manner in which he gave these answers to the 
secretary’s promptings ; of the rapidity of his utterance, 
or the violence of his tone and gesture ; in which, strug- 
gling through his Puritan’s demeanor, w^as something 
wild and ungovernable which broke through all restraint. 
For some minutes he walked rapidly up and down the 
room, then stopping suddenly, exclaimed, 

“ Gashford — Tou moved them yesterday too. Oh 
yes ! You did.” 

“ I shone with a reflected light, ray lord,” replied the 
humble secretary, laying his hand upon his heart. “ I 
did my best.” 

“ You did well,” said his master, “ and are a great and 
worthy instrument. If you will ring for John Grueby 
10 carry the portmanteau into my room, and will wait 
liere while I undress, we will dispose of business as 
visual, if you’re not too tired.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


92 

“ Too tired, my lord ! — But this is his consideration 
Christian from head to foot.” With which soliloquy, the 
secretary tilted the jiig, and looked very hard into the 
mulled wine, to see how much remained. 

John Willet and John Grueby appeared together 
The one bearing the great candlesticks, and the other 
the portmanteau, showed the deluded lord into his cham- 
ber ; and left the secretary alone, to yawn and shake 
himself, and finally, to fall asleep before the fire. 

“ Now Mr. Gashford, sir,” said John Grueby in his 
ear, after what appeared to him a moment of uncon- 
sciousness ; “ my lord’s abed.” 

“ Oh. Very good, John,” was his mild reply. “Thank 
you, John. Nobody need sit up. I know my room.” 

“ I hope you’re not a-going to trouble your head to- 
night, or my lord’s head neither, with anything more 
about Bloody Mary,” said John. “ I wish the blessed 
old creetur had never been born.” 

“ I said you might go to bed, John,” returned the sec- 
retary. “ You didn’t hear me, I think.” 

“ Between Bloody Marys, and blue cockades, and glo- 
rious Queen Besses, and no Poperys, and Protestant 
associations, and making of speeches,” pursued John 
Grueby, looking, as usual, a long way off*, and taking no 
notice of this hint, “ my lord’s half off his head. When 
we go out o’ doors, such a set of ragamuffins comes a- 
shouting after us ‘ Gordon forever ! ’ that I’m ashamed 
of myself, and don’t know where to look. When we’re 
in-doors, they come a-roaring and screaming about the 
house like so many devils ; and my lord instead of or- 
dering them to be drove away, goes out into the balcony 
and demeans himself by making speeches to ’em, and 
calls ’em ‘ Men of England,’ and ‘ Fellow-countrymen,’ 


BAKNABY BUDGE. 


93 


as if he was fond of ’em and thanked ’em for coming. 
I can’t make it out, but they’re all mixed up somehow or 
another with that unfort’nate Bloody Mary, and call her 
.name out till iHey’re hoarse. They’re all Protestants 
too — every man and boy among ’em : and Protestants 
is very fond of spoons I find, and silver plate in general, 
whenever area-gates is left open accidentally. I wish 
that was the worst of it, and that no more harm migh 
be to come ; but if you don’t stop these ugly customers 
in time, Mr. Gashford (and I know you ; you’re the 
man that blows the fire), you’ll find ’em grow a little bit 
too strong for you. One of these evenings, when the 
weather gets warmer and Prot'estants are thirsty, they’ll 
be pulling London down, — and I never heerd that 
Bloody Mary went as far as that’’ 

Gashford had vanished long ago, and these remarks 
had been bestowed on empty air. Not at all discom- 
posed by the discovery, John Grueby fixed his hat on, 
wrong side foremost, that he might be unconscious of 
the shadow of the obnoxious cockade, and withdrew to 
bed ; shaking his head in a very gloomy and prophetic 
manner until he reached his chamber. 


94 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


CHAPTER XXXVL 

Gashford, with a smiling face, but still with looks of 
profound deference and humility, betook himself towards 
his masters room, smoothing his hair down as he went, 
and humming a psalm tune. As he approached Lord 
George’s door, he cleared his throat, and hummed more 
vigorously. 

There was a remarkable contrast between this man’s 
occupation at the moment, and the expression of his 
countenance, which was singularly repulsive and mali- 
cious. His beetling brow almost obscured his eyes ; his 
lip was curled contemptuously j his very shoulders 
seemed to sneer in stealthy whisperings with his great 
flapped ears. 

“ Hush ! ” he muttered softly, as he peeped in at the 
chamber-door. “ He seems to be asleep. Pray Heaven 
he is ! Too much watching, too much care, too much 
thought — ah ! Lord preserve him for a martyr ! He 
is a saint, if ever saint drew breath on this bad earth.” 

Placing his light upon a table, he walked on tiptoe to 
the fire, and sitting in a chair before it with his back tow- 
rds the bed, went on communing with himself like one 
who thought aloud : 

“ The saviour of his country and his country’s religion, 
‘die friend of his poor countrymen, the enemy of the 
nroud and harsh ; beloved of the rejected and oppressed, 
adored by forty thousand bold and loyal English hearts 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


95 


— whfit happy slumbers liis should be ! ” And here he 
sighed, and warmed his hands, and shook his head as 
men do when their hearts are full, and heaved another 
sigh, and wai-med his hands again. 

“ Why, Gashford ? ” said Lord George, who was lying 
broad awake upon his side, and had been staring at him 
from his entrance. 

“ My — my lord,” said Gashford, starting and looking 
round as though in great surprise. “ I have disturbed 
you!” 

“ I have not been sleeping.” 

“ Not sleeping ! ” he repeated, with assumed confusion. 
“ What can I say for having in your presence given ut- 
terance to thoughts — but they were sincere — they 
were sincere I ” exclaimed the secretary, drawing his 
sleeve in a hasty way across his eyes, “ and why should 
I regret your having heard them ? ” 

“ Gashford,” said the poor lord, stretching out his 
hand with manifest emotion. “ Do not regret it. You 
love me w'ell, I know — too well. I don’t deserve such 
homage.” 

Gashford made no reply, but grasped the hand and 
pressed it to his lips. Then rising, and taking from the 
trunk a little desk, he placed it on a table near the Are, 
unlocked it with a key he carried in his pocket, sat 
down before it, took out a pen, and, before dipping it 
in the inkstand, sucked it — to compose the fashion 
of his mouth perhaps, on which a smile was hovering 
yet. 

“ How do our numbers stand since last enrolling- 
night ?” inquired Lord George. “Are we really forty 
thousand strong, or do we still speak in round numbers 
tvhen we take the Association at that amount ? ” 


96 


BAKNABY RUDGE. 


“ Our total now exceeds that number by a score and 
threCj” Gashford replied, casting his eyes upon his pa- 
pers. 

“The funds?” 

“ Not very improving ; but there is some manna in 
the wilderness, my lord. Hem ! On Friday night the 
widows’ mites dropped in. ‘ Forty scavengers, three- 
and-fourpence. An aged pew-opener of St. Martin’s 
parish, sixpence. A bell-ringer of the established 
church, sixpence. A Protestant infant, newly born, one 
halfpenny. The United Link Boys, three shillings — 
one bad. The anti-popish prisoners in Newgate, five 
and fourpence. A friend in Bedlam, half-a-crown. 
Dennis the hangman, one shilling.’ ” 

“ That Dennis,” said his lordship, “ is an earnest man. 
I marked him in the crowd in Welbeck Street, last 
Friday.” 

“ A good man,” rejoined the secretary ; “ a stanch, 
sincere, and truly zealous man.” 

“ He should be encouraged,” said Lord George. 
“ Make a note of Dennis. I’ll talk with him.” 

Gashford obeyed, and went on reading from his 
list : — 

“ ‘ The Friends of Reason, half-a-guinea. The Friends 
of Liberty, half-a-guinea. The Friends of Peace, half- 
a-guinea. The Friends of Charity, half-a-guinea. The 
Friends of Mercy, half-a-guinea. The Associated Re- 
memberers of Bloody Mary, half-a-guinea. The United 
Bull-Dogs, half-a-guinea.’ ” 

“ The United Bull-Dogs,” said Lord George, biting 
his nails most horribly, “are a new society, are they 
not ? ” 

“ Formerly the ’Prentice Knights, my lord. The in- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


07 


dentures of the old members expiring by degrees, they 
changed their name, it seems, though they still have 
'prentices among them, as well as workmen.” 

“ What is their president’s name ? ” inquired Lord 
George. 

“ President,” said Gashford, reading, “ Mr. Simon 
Tappertit.” 

“ I remember him. The little man, who sometimes 
brings an elderly sister to our meetings, and sometimes 
another female too, who is conscientious, I have no doubt, 
but not well-favored ? ” 

“ The very same, my lord.” 

“Tappertit is an earnest man,” said Lord George 
thoughtfully. “ Eh, Gashford ?” 

“ One of the foremost among them all, my lord. He 
snuffs the battle from afar, like the war-horse. He 
throws his hat up in the street as if he were inspired, 
and makes most stirring speeches from the shoulders of 
his friends.” 

“ Make a note of Tappertit,” said Lord George Gor- 
don. “We may advance him to a place of trust.” 

“ That,” rejoined the secretary, doing as he was told, 
“is all — except Mrs. Varden’s box (fourteenth time of 
opening), seven shillings and sixpence in silver and cop- 
per, and half-a-guinea in gold ; and Miggs (being the 
saving of a quarter’s wages), one-and-threepence.” 

“ Miggs,” said Lord George. “ Is that a man ? ” 

“ The name is entered on the list as a woman,” re- 
plied the secretary “ I think she is the tall spare female 
of whom you spoke just now, my lord, as not being well- 
favored, who sometimes comes to hear the speeches — 
along with Tappertit and Mrs. Varden.” 

“ Mrs. Varden is the elderly lady, then, is she ! ” 

VOL. II. 7 


98 


BARNABY RUDCxE, 


The secretary nodded, and rubbed tlie bridge of his 
nose with the feather of his pen. 

" She is a zealous sister,” said Lord George. “ Her 
collection goes on prosperously, and is pursued with fer- 
vor. Has her husband joined ? ” 

“ A malignant,” returned the secretary, folding up his 
papers. “ Unworthy such a wife. He remains in outer 
darkness, and steadily refuses.” 

“ The consequences be upon his own head ! — Gash- 
ford ! ” 

“ My lord ! ” 

“ You don’t think,” he turned restlessly in his bed as 
he spoke, “these people will desert me, when the hour 
arrives ? J have spoken boldly for them, ventured much, 
suppressed nothing. They’ll not fall off, will they ? ” 

“ No fear of that my lord,” said Gashford, with a 
meaning look, which was rather the involuntary expres- 
sion of his own thoughts than intended as any confirma- 
tion of his w'ords, for the other’s face was turned away. 
“ Be sure there is no fear of that.” 

“ Nor,” he said with a more restless motion than be- 
fore, “ of their — but they can sustain no harm from 
leaguing for this purpose. Right is on our side, though 
Might may be against us. You feel as sure of that as I 
— honestly, you do ?” 

The secretary was beginning with “You do not 
doubt,” when the other interrupted him, and impatiently 
rejoined : — 

“ Doubt. No. Who says I doubt ? If I doubted, 
should I cast away relatives, friends, everything, for this 
unhappy country’s sake; this unhappy country,” he cried, 
springing up in bed, after repeating the phrase “ un- 
happy country’s sake” to himself at least a dozen times, 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


9S 


“forsaken of God and man, delivered over to a danger- 
ous confederacy of Popish powers ; the prey of corrup- 
tion, idolatry, and despotism ! Who says I doubt ? Am 
I called, and chosen, and faithful? Tell me. Am I, or 
am I not ? ” 

“ To God, the country, and yourself,” cried Gashford. 

“ I am. I will be. I say again, I will be : to the 
block. Who says as much ! Do you ? Does any man 
alive?” 

The secretary drqoped his head with an expression of 
perfect acquiescence in anything that had been said or 
might be ; and Lord George gradually sinking down 
upon his pillow, fell asleep. 

Although there Avas' something very ludicrous in his 
vehement manner, taken in conjunction with his meagre 
aspect and ungraceful presence, it would scarcely have 
provoked a smile in any man of kindly feeling ; or even 
if it had, he would have felt sorry and almost angry with 
himself next moment, for yielding to the impulse. This 
lord was sincere in his violence and in his wavering. A 
nature prone to false enthusiasm, and the vanity of being 
a leader, were the worst qualities apparent in his compo- 
sition. All the rest was weakness — sheer weakness ; 
and it is the unhappy lot of thoroughly weak men, that 
their very sympathies, affections, confidences — all the 
qualities which in better-constituted minds are virtues — 
dwindle into foibles, or turn into doAvnright vices. 

Gashford, with many a sly look towards the bed, sa 
chuckling at his master’s folly, until his deep and heavy 
breathing warned him that he might retire. Locking his 
desk, and replacing it within the trunk (but not before 
he had taken from a secret lining two printed handbills), 
he cautiously withdrew ; looking back, as he went, at the 


100 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


pale face of the slumbering man, above whose head the 
dusty plumes that crowned the Maypole couch, waved 
drearily and sadly as though it were a bier. 

Stopping on the staircase to listen that all was quiet, 
and to take off his shoes lest his footsteps should alarm 
any light sleeper who might be near at hand, he de- 
scended to the ground floor, and thrust one of his bills 
beneath the great door of the house. That done, he 
crept softly back to his own chamber, and from the win- 
dow let another fall — carefully wrapped round a stone 
to save it from the wind — into the yard below. 

They were addressed on the back “To every Prot- 
estant into whose hands this shall come,” and bore within 
what follows: — 

“ Men and Brethren. Whoever shall find this letter, 
will take it as a warning to join, without delay, the 
friends of Lord George Gordon. There are great events 
at hand ; and the times are dangerous and troubled. 
Read this carefully, keep ii clean, and drop it somewhere 
else. For King and Country. Union.” 

“ More seed, more seed,” said Gashford as he closed 
the window. “ When will the harvest come ! ” 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


101 


CHAPTER XXXVII. 

To surround anything, however monstrous or ridic- 
ulous, with an air of mystery, is to invest it with a secret 
charm, and power of attraction which to the crowd is 
irresistible. False priests, false prophets, false doctors, 
false patriots, false prodigies of every kind, veiling their 
proceedings in mystery, have always addressed them- 
selves at an immense advantage to the popular credulity, 
and have been, perhaps, more indebted to that resource 
in gaining and keeping for a time the upper hand of 
Truth and Common Sense, than to any half-dozen items 
in the whole catalogue of imposture. Curiosity is, and 
has been from the creation of the world, a master-pas- 
sion. To awaken it, to gratify it by slight degrees, and 
yet leave something always in suspense, is to establish 
the surest hold that can be had, in wrong, on the un- 
thinking portion of mankind. 

I If a man had stood on London Bridge, calling till he 
1 was hoarse, upon the passers-by, to join with Lord 
i George Gordon, although for an object which no man 
1 understood, and which in that very incident had a charm 
1 of its own, — the probability is, that he might have in- 
fluenced a score of people in a month. If all zealous 
Protestants had been publicly urged to join an associa- 
I tion for the avowed purpose of singing a hymn or two 
occasionally, and hearing some indifferent speeches made, 
and ultimately of petitioning Parliament not to pass an 


102 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


act for abolishing the penal laws against Roman Catholic 
priests, the penalty of perpetual imprisonment denounced 
against those who educated children in that persuasion, 
and the disqualification of all members of the Romish 
church to inherit real property in the United Kingdom 
by right of purchase or descent, — matters so far re- 
moved from the business and bosoms of the mass, might 
perhaps have called together a hundred people. But 
when vague rumors got abroad, that in this Protestant 
association a secret power was mustering against the gov- 
ernment for undefined and mighty purposes ; when the 
air was filled with whispers of a confederacy among the 
Popish powers to degrade and enslave England, establish 
an inquisition in London, and turn the pens of Sraithfield 
market into stakes and caldrons ; when terrors and 
alarms which no man understood were perpetually 
broached, both in and out of Parliament, by one enthu- 
siast who did not understand himself, and bygone bug- 
bears which had lain quietly in their graves for cen- 
turies, were raised again to haunt the ignorant and 
credulous ; when all this was done, as it were, in the 
dark, and secret invitations to join the Great Protestant 
Association in defence of religion, life, and liberty, were 
dropped in the public ways, thrust under the house-doors, 
tossed in at windows, and })ressed into the hands of those 
who trod the streets by night ; when they glared from 
every wall, and shone on every post and pillar, so that 
stocks and stones appeared infected with the common 
fear, urging all men to join together blindfold in resist- 
ance of they knew not what, they knew not why ; — 
then the mania spread indeed, and the body, still increas- 
ing every day, grew forty thousand strong. 

So said, at least, in this month of March, 1780, Lord 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


103 


George Gordon, the Association’s president. Whether 
it was the fact or otherwise, few men knew, or cared to 
ascertain. It had never made any public demonstration ; 
had scarcely ever been heard of, save through him ; had 
never been seen ; and was supposed by many to be the 
mere creature of his disordered brain. He was accus- 
tomed to talk largely about numbers of men — stimu- 
lated, as it was inferred, by certain successful disturb- 
ances, arising out of the same subject, which had occurred 
in Scotland in the previous year ; was looked upon as a 
cracked-brained member of the lower house, who at- 
tacked all parties and sided with none, and was very 
little regarded. It was known that there was discontent 
abroad — there always is ; he had been accustomed to 
address the people by placard, speech, and pamphlet, 
upon other questions ; nothing had come, in England, 
of his past exertions, and nothing was apprehended 
from his present. Just as he has come upon the reader, 
he had come, from time to time, upon the public, and 
been forgotten in a day ; as suddenly as he appears in 
these pages, after a blank of five long years, did he and 
his proceedings begin to force themselves, about this 
period, upon the notice of thousands of people, who had 
mingled in active life during the whole interval, and 
who, without being deaf or blind to passing events, had 
scarcely ever thought of him before. 

“ My lord,” said Gashford in his ear, as he drew the 
curtains of his bed betimes ; “ my lord ! ” 

“ Yes — who’s that ? What is it ? ” 

“ The clock has struck nine,” returned the secretary, 
with meekly folded hands. You have slept well ? I 
hope you have slept well? If my prayers are heard, 
you are refreshed indeed.” 


104 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ To say the truth, I have slept so soundly,” said Lord 
George, rubbing his eyes and looking round the room, 
“ that I don’t remember quite — what place is this ? 

“ My lord ! ” cried Gashford, with a smile. 

“ Oh ! ” returned his superior. “ Yes. You’re not a 
Jew then ? ” 

“ A Jew ! ” exclaimed the pious secretary, recoiling 

“ I dreamed that we were Jews, Gashford. You and 
I — both of us — Jews with long beards.” 

“ Heaven forbid, my lord ! We might as well be 
Papists.” 

“ I suppose we might,” returned the other, very 
quickly. “ Eh ? You really think so, Gashford ? ” 

“ Surely I do,” the secretary cried, with looks of 
great surprise. 

“ Humph ! ” he muttered. “ Yes that seems reason 
able.” 

“ I hope my lord ” — the secretary began. 

“ Hope ! ” he echoed, interrupting him. “ Why do 
you say, you hope ? There’s no harm in thinking of 
such things.” 

“ Not in dreams,” returned the secretary. 

“ In dreams ! No, nor waking either.” 

— “ ‘ Called, and chosen, and faithful,’ ” said Gash- 
ford, taking up Lord George’s watch which lay upon 
a chair, and seeming to read the inscription on the 
Beal, abstractedly. 

It was the slightest action possible, not obtruded on 
his notice, and apparently the result of a moment’s ab- 
sence of mind, not worth remark. But as the words 
were uttered, Lord George, who had been going on 
impetuously, stopped short, reddened, and was silent 
Apparently quite unconscious of this change in his do- 


BAKNABY BUDGE. 


105 


meanor, the wily secretary stepped a little apart, under 
pretence of pulling up the window-blind, and returning, 
when the other had had time to recover, said : — 

“ The holy cause goes bravely on, my lord. I was 
pot idle, even last night. I dropped two of the hand- 
ills before I went to bed, and both are gone this morn- 
ing. Nobody in the house has mentioned the circum- 
stance of finding them, though I have been down-stairs 
full half an hour. One or two recruits will be their first 
fruit, I predict ; and who shall* say how many more, with 
Heaven’s blessing on your inspired exertions ! ” 

“ It was a famous device in the beginning,” replied 
Lord George ; “ an excellent device, and did good ser- 
vice in Scotland. It was quite worthy of you. You 
remind me not to be a sluggard, Gashford, when the vine- 
yard is menaced with destruction, and may be trodden 
down by Papist feet. Let the horses be saddled in half 
an hour. We must be up and doing ! ” 

He said this with a heightened color, and in a tone of 
such enthusiasm, that the secretary deemed all further 
prompting needless, and withdrew. 

— “ Dreamed he was a Jew,” he said thoughtfully, as 
he closed the bedroom door. “ He may come to that be- 
fore he dies. It’s like enough. Well! After a time, 
and provided I lost nothing by it, I don’t see why that 
•eligion shouldn’t suit me as well as any other. There 
are rich men among the Jews ; shaving is very trouble- 
forae ; — yes, it would suit me well enough. For the 
present, though, we must be Christian to the core. Our 
prophetic motto will suit all creeds in their turn, that’s a 
comfort.” Reflecting on this source of consolation, he 
reached the sitting-room, and rang the bell for break- 
fast. 


106 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Lord George was quickly dressed (for his plain toilet 
was easily made), and as he was no less frugal in his 
repasts than in his Puritan attire, his share of the meal 
was soon despatched. The secretary, however, more de- 
voted to the good things of this world, or more intent on 
sustaining his strength and spirits for the sake of the 
Protestant cause, ate and drank to the last minute, and 
required indeed some three or four reminders from John 
Grueby, before he could resolve to tear himself away 
from Mr. Willet’s plentiful providing. 

At length he came down-stairs, wiping his greasy 
mouth, and having paid John Willet’s bill, climbed into 
his saddle. Lord George, who had been walking up and 
down before the house talking to himself with earnest 
gestures, mounted his horse ; and returning old John 
Willet’s stately bow, as well as the parting salutation of 
a dozen idlers whom the rumor of a live lord being 
about to leave the Maypole had gathered round the 
])orch, they rode away, with stout John Grueby in the 
rear. 

If Lord George Gordon had appeared in the eyes of 
Mr. Willet, overnight, a nobleman of somewhat quaint 
and odd exterior, the impression was confirmed this 
morning, and increased a hundred-fold. Sitting bolt 
upright upon his bony steed, with his long, straight hair, 
dangling about his face and fluttering in the wind ; his 
limbs all angular and rigid, his elbows stuck out on 
either side ungracefully, and his whole frame jogged and 
shaken at every motion of his horse’s feet ; a more gro- 
tesque or more ungainly figure can hardly be conceived. 
In lieu of whip, he carried in his hand a great gold- 
headed cane, as large as any footman carries in these 
days ; and his various modes of holding this unwieldy 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


107 


weapon — now upright before his face like the sabre of 
a horse-soldier, now over his shoulder like a musket, now 
between his finger and thumb, but always in some un- 
couth and awkward fiishion — contributed in no small 
degree to the absurdity of his appearance. Stiff, lank, 
and solemn, dressed in an unusual manner, and osten- 
tatiously exhibiting — whether by design or accident — 
all his peculiarities of carriage, gesture, and conduct ; all 
the qualities, natural and artificial, in which he differed 
from other men ; he might have moved the sternest 
looker-on to laughter, and fully provoked the smiles and 
whispered jests which greeted his departure from the 
Maypole inn. 

Quite unconscious, however, of the effect he produced, 
he trotted on beside his secretary, talking to himself 
nearly all the way, until they came within a mile or two 
of London, when now and then some passenger went by 
who knew him by sight, and pointed him out to some 
one else, and perhaps stook looking after him, or cried 
in jest or earnest as it might be, “ Hurrah Geordie ! No 
Popery ! ” At which he would gravely pull off his hat, 
and bow. When they reached the town and rode along 
the streets, these notices became more frequent ; some 
laughed, some hissed, some turned their heads and 
smiled, some wondered who he was, some ran along 
the pavement by his side and cheered. When this 
happened in a crush of carts and chairs and coaches, 
le would make a dead ’Stop, and pulling off his hat, 
cry, “ Gentlemen, No Popery ! to which the gentle- 
men would respond with lusty voices, and with three 
vmes three ; and then, on he would go again with a 
Bcoi'e or so of the raggedest, following at his horse’s 
heels, and shouting till their throats were parched. 


108 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


The old ladies too — there were a great many old 
ladies in the streets, and these all knew him. Some of 
them — not those of the highest rank, but such as sold 
fruit from baskets and carried burdens — clapped their 
shrivelled hands, and raised a weazen, piping, shrill 
“ Hurrah, ray lord.” Others waved their hands or hand- 
kerchiefs, or shook their fans or parasols, or threw up 
windows and called in haste to those within, to come and 
see. All these marks of popular esteem, he received 
with profound gravity and respect ; bowing very low, 
and so frequently that his hat was more off his head 
than on ; and looking up at the houses as he passed 
along, with the air of one who was making a public 
entry, and yet was not pufied-up or proud. 

So they rode (to the deep and unspeakable disgust of 
John Grueby) the whole length of Whitechapel, Lead- 
enhall-street, and Cheapside, and into Saint Paul’s 
Church-yard. Arriving close to the cathedral, he halted ; 
spoke to Gashford; and looking upward at its lofty 
dome, shook his head, as though he said “ The Church 
in Danger! ” Then to be sure, the by-standers stretched 
their throats indeed ; and he went on again with mighty 
acclamations from the mob, and lower bows than ever. 

So along the Strand, up Swallow-street, into the Ox- 
ford-road, and thence to his house in Welbeck-street, 
near Cavendish-square, whither he was attended by a 
few dozen idlers ; of whom he took leave on the steps 
with this brief parting, “ Gentlemen, No Popery. Good- 
day. God bless you.” This being rather a shorter ad- 
dress than they expected, was received with some dis- 
pleasure, and cries of “ A speech ! a speech 1 ” which 
might have been complied with, but that John Grueby, 
making a mad charge upon them with all three horses, 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


109 


on his way to the stables, caused them to disperse into 
the adjoining fields, where they presently fell to pitch 
and toss, chuck-farthing, odd or even^ dog-fighting, and 
other Protestant recreations. 

In the afternoon Lord George came forth again, 
dressed in a black velvet coat, and trousers and waist- 
coat of the Gordon plaid, all of the same Quaker cut: 
and in this costume, which made him look a dozen times 
more strange and singular than before, went down on 
foot to Westminster. Gashford, meanwhile, bestirred 
himself in business matters ; with which he was still en- 
gaged when, shortly after dusk, John Grueby entered 
and announced a visitor, 

“ Let him come in,” said Gashford. 

“ Here ! come in ! ” growled John to somebody with- 
out ; You’re a Protestant, a’n’t you ? ” 

“ I should think so,” replied a deep, gruff voice. 

“ You’ve the looks of it,” said John Grueby. “ I’d 
have known you for one anywhere.” With which re- 
mark he gave the visitor admission, retired, and shut the 
door. 

The man who now confronted Gashford, was a squat, 
thick-set personage, with a low retreating forehead, a 
coarse shock head of hair, and eyes so small and near 
together, that his broken nose alone seemed to prevent 
their meeting and fusing into one of the usual size. A 
lingy handkerchief twisted like a cord about his neck, 
left its great veins exposed to view, and they were swol- 
len and starting, as though with gulping down strong 
passions, malice, and ill-will. His dress was of thread- 
bare velveteen — a faded, rusty, whitened black, like the 
ashes of a pipe' or a coal-fire after a day’s extinction ; 
discolored with the soils of many a stale debauch, and 


no 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


reeking yet with pot-house odors. In lieu of buckles at 
his knees, he wore unequal loops of packthread ; and in 
his grimy hands»he held a knotted stick, the knob of 
which was carved into a rough likeness of his own vile 
face. Such was the visitor who doffed his three-cornered 
hat in Gashford’s presence, and waited, leering, for hi 
notice. 

“ Ah ! Dennis ! ” cried the secretary. “ Sit down.” 

“ I see my lord down yonder ” — cried the man, with 
a jerk of his thumb towmrds the quarter that he spoke 
of, “ and he says to me, says my lord, ‘ If you’ve nothing 
to do, Dennis, go up to my house, and talk with Muster 
Gashford.’ Of course I’d nothing to do, you know. 
These a’n’t my working hours. Ha, ha! I was a-taking 
the air when I see my lord, that’s what I w^as doing. I 
takes the air by night, as the howls does, Muster Gash- 
ford.” 

“ And sometimes in the daytime, eh ? ” said the secre- 
tary — “ when you go out in state you know.” 

“ Ha, ha ! ” roared the fellow, smiting his leg ; “ for a 
gentleman as ’ull say a pleasant thing in a pleasant way, 
give me Muster Gashford agin’ all London and West- 
minster ! My lord a’n’t a bad ’un at that, but he’s a fool 
to you. Ah to be sure, — when I go out in state.” 

“ And have your carriage,” said the secretary ; “ and 
your chaplain, eh ? and all the rest of it ? ” 

“ You’ll be the death of me,” cried Dennis, with an- 
other roar, “you will. But what’s in the wind now, 
'Muster Gashford.” he asked hoarsely. “ Eh ? Are we 
to be under orders to pull down one of them Popish 
chapels — or what ? ” 

“ Hush ! ” said the secretary, suffering the faintest 
smile to play upon his face. “ Hush ! God bless me, Den* 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Ill 


nis ! We associate, you know, for strictly peaceable and 
lawful purposes.” 

“ 1 know, bless you,” returned the man, thrusting his 
tongue into his cheek ; “ I entered a’ purpose, didn’t I ! ” 

“ No doubt,” said Gashford, smiling as before. And 
when he said so, Dennis roared again, and smote his leg 
still harder, and falling into fits of laughter, wiped his 
eyes with the corner of his neckerchief, and cried, “ Mus- 
ter Gashford agin’ all England hollow ! ” 

“ Lord George and I were talking of you last night,” 
said Gashford, after a pause. “ He says you ai’e a very 
earnest fellow.” 

“ So I am,” returned the hangman. 

“ And that you truly hate the Papists.” 

“ So I do,” and he confirmed it with a good round 
oath. “ Lookye here. Muster Gashford,” said the fel- 
low, laying his hat and stick upon the floor, and slowly 
beating the palm of one hand with the fingers of the 
other. “ Ob-serve. I’m a constitutional ofiicer that 
works for my living, and does my work creditable. Do 
I, or do I not ? ” 

“ Unquestionably.” 

“ Very good. Stop a minute. My work is sound, 
Protestant, constitutional, English work. Is it, or is it 
not?” 

“ No man alive can doubt it.” 

“ Nor dead neither. Parliament says this here — - 
bays Parliament, ‘ If any man, woman, or child does any- 
thing which goes again a certain number of our acts ’ — • 
how many hanging laws may there be at this presen 
time, Muster Gashford? Fifty?” 

“ I don’t exactly know how many,” replied Gashford, 
Vaning back in his chair and yawning ; “ a great num- 
ber though.” 


112 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ Well ; say fifty. Parliament says, ‘ If any man, 
woman, or child does anything again any one of them 
fifty acts, that man, woman, or child shall be worked off" 
by Dennis.’ George the Third steps in when they num- 
ber very strong at the end of a sessions, and says 
‘ These are too many for Dennis. I’ll have half for my 
self and Dennis shall have half for Az;wself ; ’ and some 
times he throws me in one over that I don’t expect, as 
he did three years ago, when I got INIary Jones, a young 
woman of nineteen who come up to Tyburn with a in- 
fant at her breast, and was worked oflP for taking a piece 
of cloth off the counter of a shop in Ludgate-hill, and 
putting it down again when the shopman see her ; and 
who had never done any harm before, and only tried to 
do that, in consequence of her husband having been 
pressed three weeks previous, and she being left to beg, 
with two young children — as was proved upon the trial. 
Ha, ha ! — Well ! That being the law and the practice 
of England, is the glory of England, a’n’t it. Muster 
Gashford?” 

“ Certainly,” said the secretary. 

“ And in times to come,” pursued the hangman, “ if 
our grandsons should think of their gi*andfathers’ times, 
and find these things altered, they’ll say, ‘Those were 
days indeed, and we’ve been going down hill ever since.’ 
— Won’t they. Muster Gashford ? ” 

“ I have no doubt they will,” said the secretary. 

“ Well then, look here,” said the hangman. “ If tlies 
Papists gets into power, and begins to boil and roast in- 
rjead of hang, what becomes of my work ! If they 
touch my work, that’s a part of so many laws, what be- 
comes of the laws in general, what becomes of the relig- 
ion, what becomes of the country ! — Did you ever go 
to church. Muster Gashford ? ” 


BARNABY KUDGE. 


113 


“ Ever ! ” repeated the secretary with some indigna- 
tion ; “ of course.” 

“Well,” said the ruffian, “I’ve been once — twice, 
counting the time I was christened — and when I heard 
the Parliament prayed for, and thought how many new 
hanging laws they made every sessions, T considered that 
I was prayed for. Now mind. Muster Gashford,’’ said 
the fellow, taking up his stick and shaking it with a fero- 
cious air, “ I mustn’t have my Protestant work touched, 
nor this here Protestant state of things altered in no 
degree, if I can help it ; I mustn’t have no Papists in- 
terfering with me, unless they come to me to be worked 
off in course of law ; I mustn’t have no biling, no roast- 
ing, no frying — nothing but hanging. My lord may 
well call me an earnest fellow. In support of the great 
Protestant principle of having plenty of that. I’ll,” and 
here he beat his club upon the ground, “ burn, fight, kill 

— do anything you bid me, so that it’s bold and devilish 

— though the end of it was, that I got hung myself. — 
There, Muster Gashford!” 

He appropriately followed up this frequent prostitu- 
tion of a noble word to the vilest purposes, by pouring 
out in a kind of ecstasy, at least a score of most tre- 
mendous oaths ; then wiped his heated face upon his 
neckerchief, and cried, “ No Popery ! I’m a reli^ous 
man, by G — ! ” 

Gashford had leant back in his chair, regarding him 
with eyes so sunken, and so shadowed by his heavy 
brows, that for aught the hangman saw of them, he 
might have been stone blind. He remained smiling in 
silence for a short time longer, and then said, slowly and 
distinctly : — 

“ You are indeed an earnest fellow, Dennis — a most 

VOL. n. 8 


114 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


valuable fellow — the stanchest man I know of in our 
ranks. But you must calm yourself ; you must be 
peaceful, lawful, mild as any lamb. I am sure you will 
be though.” 

“ Ay, ay, we shall see. Muster Gashford, we shall see. 
You won’t have to complain of me,” returned the other, 
shaking his head. 

“ I am sure I shall not,” said the secretary in the 
same mild tone, and wdth the same emphasis. “ We 
shall have, we think, about next month or May, when 
this Papist relief bill comes before the house, to con- 
vene our whole body for the first time. My lord has 
thoughts of our walking in procession through the 
streets — just as an innocent display of strength — and 
accompanying our petition down to the door of the 
House of Commons.” 

“ The sooner the better,” said Dennis wdth another 
oath. 

“We shall have to draw up in divisions, our num- 
bers being so large ; and, I believe, I may venture to 
say,” resumed Gashford, affecting not to hear the in- 
terruption, “ though I have no direct instructions to 
that effect — that Lord George has thought of you as 
an excellent leader for one of these parties. I have 
no doubt you would be an admirable one.” 

“ Try me,” said the fellow, with an ugly wink. 

“ You would be cool, I know,” pursued the secre- 
tary, still smiling, and still managing his eyes, so that he 
t^ould watch him closely, and really not be seen in 
turn, “ obedient to orders, and perfectly temperate. 
You would lead your party into no danger I am cer- 
tain.” 

“ I’d lead them. Muster Gashford ” — the hangman 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


115 


was beginning in a reckless way, when Gashford started 
forward, laid his finger on his lips, and feigned to write, 
just as the door was opened by John Grueby. 

“ Oh ! ” said John, looking in ; “ Iiere’s another Protes- 
tant.’* 

“Some other, room, John,” cried Gashford in hi 
blandest voice. “ I am engaged just now,” 

But John had brought this new visitor to the door, 
and he walked in unbidden, as the words were uttered ; 
giving to view the form and features, rough attire, and 
reckless air, of Hugh. 


116 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


CHAPTER XXXVIII. 

The secretary put his hand before his eyes to shade 
them from the glare of the lamp, and for some moments 
looked at Hugh with a frowning brow, as if he remem- 
bered to have seen him lately, but could not call to mind 
where, or on what occasion. His uncertainty was very 
brief, for before Hugh had spoken a word, he said, as his 
countenance cleared up : — 

“Ay, .ay, I recollect. It’s quite right, John, you 
needn’t wait. Don’t go, Dennis.” 

“ Your servant, master,” said Hugh, as Grueby dis- 
appeared. 

“ Yours friend,” returned the secretary in his smooth- 
est manner. “ What brings you here ? We left nothing 
behind us, I hope ? ” 

Hugh gave a short laugh, and thrusting his hand 
into his breast, produced one of the handbills, soiled 
and dirty from lying out of doors all night, which he 
laid upon the secretary’s desk after flattening it upon 
his knee, and smoothing out the wrinkles with his 
heavy palm. 

“ Nothing but that, master. It fell into good hands, 
you see.” 

“ What is this ! ” said Gashford, turning it over with 
an air of perfectly natural surprise. “ Where did you 
get it from, my good fellow ; what does it mean ? I 
don’t understand this at all.” 


BARNABY RUDGK 


117 


A little disconcerted by this reception, Hugh looked 
from the secretary to Dennis, who had risen and was 
standing at the table too, observing the stranger by 
stealth, and seeming to derive the utmost satisfaction 
from his manners and appearance. Considering himself 
silently appealed to by this action, Mr. Dennis shook 
his head thrice, as if to say of Gashford, “ No. He 
don^t know anything at all about it. I know he don’t. 
I’ll take my oath he don’t ; ” and hiding his profile from 
Hugh with one long end of his frowzy neckerchief, nod- 
ded and chuckled behind this screen in extreme approval 
of the secretary’s proceedings. 

‘‘ It tells the man that finds it, to come here, don’t 
it ? ” asked Hugh. “ I’m no scholar, myself, but I 
showed it to a friend, and he said it did.” 

“ It certainly does,” said Gashford, opening his eyes 
to their utmost width ; “ really this is the most remark- 
able circumstance I have ever known. How did you 
come by this piece of paper, my good friend ? ” 

“ Muster Gashford,” wheezed the hangman under his 
breath, “ agin’ all Newgate ! ” 

Whether Hugh heard him, or saw by his manner that 
he was being played upon, or perceived the secretary’s 
drift of himself, he came in his blunt way to the point 
at once. 

“ Here ! ” he said, stretching out his hand and taking 
it back ; “ never mind the bill, or what it says, or 
what it don’t say. You don’t know anything about it, 
master, — no more do I, — no more does he,’! glancing 
at Dennis. “ None of us know what it means, or where 
it comes from ; there’s an end of that. Now I want 
to make one against the Catholics, I’m a No-Popery 
man, and ready to be sworn in. That’s what I’ve come 
here for.” 


118 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ Put him down on the roll, Muster Gashford,” said 
Dennis approvingly. “ That’s the way to go to work — 
right to the end at once, and no palaver.” 

“ What’s the use of shooting wide of the mark, eh, 
old boy ! ” cried Hugh. 

“ My sentiments all over ! ” rejoined the hangman. 

“ This is the sort of chap for my division. Muster 

Gashford. Down with him, sir. Put him on the roll. 

I’d stand godfather to him, if he was to be christened 

in a bonfire, made of the ruins of the Bank of Eng- 
land.” 

With these and other expressions of confidence of 
the like flattering kind, Mr. Dennis gave him a hearty 
slap on the back, which Hugh was not slow to re- 
turn. 

“ No Popery, brother ! ” cried the hangman. 

“ No Property, brother ! ” responded Hugh. 

“ Popery, Popery,” said the secretary with his usual 
mildness. 

“ It’s all the same ! ” cried Dennis. “ It’s all right. 
Down with him. Muster Gashford. Down with every- 
body, down with everything ! Hurrah for the Prot- 
estant religion ! That’s the time of day. Muster Gash- 
ford!” 

The secretary regarded them both with a very favor- 
able expression of countenance, while they gave loose 
to these and other demonstrations of their patriotic pur- 
pose ; and was about to make some remark aloud, when 
Dennis, stepping up to him, and shading his mouth with 
hi§ hand, said, in a hoarse whisper, as he nudged him 
with his elbow : — 

“ Don’t split upon a constitutional officer’s profes- 
Bion, Muster Gashford. There are popular preju* 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


119 


dices, you know, and he mightn’t like it. Wait till 
he comes to be more intimate with me. He’s a fine- 
built chap, a’n’t he ? ” 

“ A powerful fellow indeed ! ” 

“ Did you ever. Muster Gashford,” whispered Dennis, 
with a horrible kind of admiration, such as that with 
which a cannibal might regard his intimate friend, 
when hungry, — “ did you ever ” — and here he drew 
still closer to his ear, and fenced his mouth with both 
his open hands — “see such a throat as his? Do but 
cast your eye upon it. There’s a neck for stretching. 
Muster Gashford ! ” 

The secretary assented to this proposition with the 
best grace he could assume — it is difficult to feign a 
true professional relish : which is eccentric sometimes 
— and after asking the candidate a few unimportant 
questions, proceeded to enroll him a member of the 
Great Protestant Association of England. If anything 
could have exceeded Mr. Dennis’s joy on the happy 
conclusion of this ceremony, it would have been the 
rapture with which he received the announcement that 
the new member could neither read nor write : those 
two arts being (as Mr. Dennis swore) the greatest 
possible curse a civilized community could know, and 
militating more against the professional emoluments and 
usefulness of the great constitutional office he had the 
honor to hold, than any adverse circumstances that could 
present themselves to his imagination. 

The enrolment being completed, and Hugh having 
been informed by Gashford, in his peculiar manner, of 
the peaceful and strictly lawful objects contemplated by 
•he body to which he now belonged — during which re- 
•cital Mr. Dennis nudged him very much with his elbow, 


120 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


and made divers remarkable faces — the secretary gave 
them both to understand that he desired to be alone. 
Therefore they took their leaves without delay, and came 
out of the house together. 

“ Are you walking, brother ? ” said Dennis. 

“ Ay ! ” returned Hugh. “ Where you will.” 

“ That’s social,” said his new friend. “ Which way 
shall we take ? Shall we go and have a look at doors 
that we shall make a pretty good clattering at, before 
long — eh, brother ? ” 

Hugh answered in the affirmative, they went slowly 
down to Westminster, where both houses of Parlia- 
ment were then sitting. Mingling in the crowd of 
carriages, horses, servants, chairmen, link-boys, por- 
ters, and idlers of all kinds, they lounged about ; 
while Hugh’s new friend pointed out to him signifi- 
cantly the weak parts of the building, how easy it was 
to get into the lobby, and so to the very door of the 
House of Commons; and how plainly, when they 
marched down there in grand array, their roars and 
shouts would be heard by the members inside; with a 
great deal more to the same purpose, all of which Hugh 
received with manifest delight. 

He told him, too, who some of the Lords and Com- 
mons were, by name, as they came in and out ; whether 
they were friendly to the Papists or otherwise ; and bade 
him take notice of their liveries and equipages, that he 
might be sure of them, in case of need. Sometimes he 
drew him close to the windows of a passing carriage, 
that he might see its master’s face by the light of the 
lamps ; and, both in respect of people and localities, he 
showed so much acquaintance with everything around, 
that it was plain he had often studied there before ; as 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


121 


indeed, when they grew a little more confidential, he 
confessed he had. 

Perhaps the most striking part of all this was, the 
number of people — never in groups of more than 
two or three together — who seemed to be skulking 
about the crowd for the same purpose. To the greatei 
part of these, a slight nod or a look from Hugh’s com- 
panion was sufficient greeting ; but now and then, some 
man would come and stand beside him in the throng, 
and, without turning his head or appearing to commu- 
nicate with him, would say a word or two in a low 
voice, which he would answer in the same cautious 
manner. Then they would part like strangers. Some 
of these men often reappeared again unexpectedly 
in the crowd close to Hugh, and, as they passed by, 
pressed his hand, or looked him sternly in the face ; 
but they never spoke to him, nor he to them ; no, not a 
word. 

It was remarkable, too, that whenever they happened 
to stand where there was any press of people, and Hugh 
chanced to be looking downward, he was sure to see an 
arm stretched out — under his own perhaps, or perhaps 
across him — which thrust some paper into the hand or 
I pocket of a by-stander, and was so suddenly withdrawn 
I that it was impossible to tell from whom it came ; nor 
I could he see in any face, on glancing quickly round, 
i the least confusion or surprise. They often trod upon 
a paper like the one* he carried in his breast, but his 
companion whispered him not to touch it or to take it 
up, — not even to look towards it, — so there they let 
i,hem lie, and passed on. 

When they had paraded the street and all the ave- 
nues of the building in this manner for near two hours, 


122 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


they turned away, and his friend asked him what ha 
thought of what he had seen, and whether he was 
prepared for a good hot piece of work if it should 
come to that. “ The hotter the better,” said Hugh, 
“ Tm prepared for anything.” — “ So am I,” said his 
friend, “ and so are many of us ; ” and they shook hands 
upon it with a great oath, and with many terrible impre- 
cations on the Papists. 

As they were thirsty by this time, Dennis proposed 
that they should repair together to The Boot, where 
there was good company and strong liquor. Hugh 
yielding a ready assent, they bent their steps that way 
with no loss of time. 

This Boot was a lone house of public entertainment, 
situated in the fields at the back of the Foundling Hos- 
pital ; a very solitary spot at that period, and quite de- 
serted after dark. The tavern stood at some distance 
from any high road, and was approachable only by a 
dark and narrow lane ; so that Hugh was much sur- 
prised to find several people drinking there, and great 
merriment going on. He was still more surprised to 
find among them almost every face that had caught 
his attention in the crowd ; but his companion having 
whispered him outside the door, that it was not con- 
sidered good manners at The Boot to appear at all 
curious about the company, he kept his own counsel, 
md made no show of recognition. 

Before putting his lips to th^ liquor which was 
brought for them, Dennis drank in a loud voice the 
health of Lord George Gordon, President of the Great 
Protestant Association ; which toast Hugh pledged like- 
wise, with corresponding enthusiasm. A fiddler who 
was present, and who appeared to act as the appointed 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


123 


minstrel of the company, forthwith struck up a Scotch' 
reel ; and that in tones so invigorating, that Hugh and 
his friend (who had both been drinking before) rose 
from their seats as by previous concert, and to the 
great admiration of the assembled guests, performed 
an extempoianeous No-Popery Dance. ' 




) 


-jr 



i » I I 




124 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


CHAPTER XXXIX. , 

The applause which the performance of Hugh and 
his new' friend elicited from the company at The Boot, 
had not yet ^bsided, and the two dancers w^ere still 
panting from their exertions, which had been of a rather 
extreme and violent character, when the party was 
reinforced by the arrival of some more guests, who, 
being a detachment of United Bulldogs, were received 
with very flattering marks of distinction and respect. 

The leader of this small party — for, including him- 
self, they were but three in number — w'as our old ac- 
quaintance, Mr. Tappertit, who seemed, physically speak- 
ing, to have grown smaller with years (particularly as to 
his legs, which were stupendously little), but who, in a 
moral point of view, in personal dignity and self-esteem, 
had sw^elled into a giant. Nor was it by any means 
difl&cult for the most unobservant person to detect this 
state of feeling in the quondam ’Prentice, for it not only 
proclaimed itself impressively and beyond mistake in his 
majestic walk and kindling eye, but found a striking 
means of revelation in his turned-up nose, \vhich scouted 
all things of earth with deep* disdain, and sought com- 
munion with its kindred skies. 

Mr. Tappertit, as chief or captain of the Bulldogs, 
was attended by his two lieutenants ; one, the tall com- 
rade of his younger life ; the other, a ’Prentice Knight 
in days of yore — Mark Gilbert, bound in the olden 


BARNABY KUDGE. 


125 


time to Thomas Curzon of the Golden Fleece. These 
gentlemen, like himself, were now emancipated from 
their ^Prentice thraldom, and served as journeymens^ but 
they were, in humble emulation of his great example, 
bold and daring spirits, and aspired to a distinguished 
state in great political events. Hence their connection 
with the Protestant Association of England, sanctioned 
by the name of Lord George Gordon ; and hence their 
present visit to The Boot. 

“ Gentlemen ! ” said Mr. Tappertit, taking off his hat 
as a great general might in addressing his troops. “ Well 
met. My lord does me and you the honor to send his 
compliments per self.” 

“ You’ve seen my lord too, have you ? ” said Dennis. 
“/ see him this afternoon.” 

“ My duty called me to the Lobby when our shop 
shut up ; and I saw him there, sir,” Mr. Tappertit re- 
plied, as he and his lieutenants took their seats. “ How 
do you do?” 

“ Lively, master, lively,” said the fellow. “ Here’s 
a new brother, regularly put down in black and white 
by Muster Gashford ; a credit to the cause ; one of the 
stick-at-nothing sort ; one arter my own heart. D’ye 
see him ? Has he got the looks of a man that’ll do, 
do you think ? ” he cried, as he slapped Hugh on the 
back. 

“ Looks or no looks,” said Hugh, with a drunken flour 
ish of his arm, “I’m the man you want. I hate the 
Papists, every one of ’em. They hate me and I hate 
them. They do me all the harm they can, and I’ll do 
them all the harm 7 can. Hurrah ! ” 

“ Was there ever.” said Dennis, looking round the 
room, when the echo of his boisterous voice had died 


126 


BARNABT RUDGE. 


away ; “ was there ever such a game boy ! Why, I 
mean to say, brothers, tliat if Muster Gashford had gone 
a hundred mile and got together fifty men of the com- 
mon run, they wouldn’t have been worth this one.” 

The greater part of the company implicitly subscribed 
to this opinion, and testified their faith in Hugh, by 
nods and looks of great significance. Mr. Tappertit sat 
and contemplated him for a long time in silence, as if he 
suspended his judgment ; then drew a little nearer to 
him, and eyed him over more carefully ; then went close 
up to him, and took him apart into a dark corner. 

“I say,” he began, with a thoughtful brow, “haven’t 
I seen you before ? ” 

“ It’s like you may,” said Hugh, in his careless way. 
“I don’t know; shouldn’t wonder.” 

“ No, but it’s very easily settled,” returned Sim. 
“ Look at me. Did you ever see me before ? You 
wouldn’t be likely to forget it, you know, if you ever 
did. Look at me. Don’t be afraid ; I won’t do you 
any harm. Take a good look — steady now.” 

The encouraging way in which Mr. Tappertit made 
this request, and coupled it with an assurance that he 
needn’t be frightened, amused Hugh mightily — so much 
indeed, that he saw nothing at all of the small man 
before him, through closing his eyes in a fit of hearty 
laughter, which shook his great broad sides until they 
ached again. 

“ Come ! ” said Mr. Tappertit, growing a little impa- 
tient under this disrespectful treatment. “ Do you know 
me, feller ? ” 

“ Not I,” cried Hugh. “ Ha, ha, ha ! Not I ! But i 
should like to.” 

“ And yet I’d have wagered a seven-shilling piece,” 


HAHNAHY HUDGK. 


127 


said Mr. Tappertit, folding his arms, and confronting 
him with his legs wide apart and firmly planted on 
the ground, “ that you once w'ere hostler at the May- 
pole.” 

Hugh opened his eyes on hearing this, and looked at 
him in great surprise. 

— “ And so you were, too, ” said Mr. Tappertit, 
pushing him away, with a condescending playfulness. 
“ When did my eyes ever deceive — unless it was a 
young woman! Don’t you know me now? ’ 

“ Why it a’n’t ” — Hugh faltered. 

“ A’n’t it ? ” said Mr. Tappertit. “ Are you sure of 
that? You remember G. Varden, don’t you?” 

Certainly Hugh did, and he remembered D. Varden 
too ; but that he didn’t tell him. 

“ You remember coming down there, before I was 
out of my time, to ask after a vagabond that had bolted 
off, and left his disconsolate father a prey to the bit- 
terest emotions, and all the rest of it — don’t you ? ” 
said Mr. Tappertit. 

“ Of course I do ! ” cried Hugh. “ And I saw you 
there.” 

“ Saw me there ! ” said Mr. Tappertit. “ Yes, I should 
think you did see me there. The place would be troub- 
led to go on without me. Don’t you remember my 
thinking you liked the vagabond, and on that account 
going to quarrel with you ; and then finding you de- 
tested him worse than poison, going to drink with you ? 
Don’t you remember that ? ” 

“ To be sure I ” cried Hugh. 

“ Well ! and are you in the same mind now ? ” said 
Mr. Tappertit. 

“ Yes ! ” roared Hugh. 


128 


BARNABY KUDGE. 


“ You speak like a man,” said Mr. Tappertit, “ and 
ril shake hands with you.” With these conciliatory 
expressions he suited the action to the word ; and Hugh 
meeting his advances readily, they performed the cere- 
mony with a show of great heartiness. 

“ I find,” said Mr. Tappertit, looking round on the 
assembled guests, “ that brother What’s-his-name and I 
are old acquaintance. — You never heard anything more 
of that rascal, I suppose, eh ? ” 

“ Not a syllable,” replied Hugh. “ I never want 
to. I don’t believe I ever shall. He’s dead long ago, 
I hope.” 

“ It’s to be hoped, for the sake of mankind in gen- 
eral and the happiness of society, that he is,” said Mr. 
Tappertit, rubbing his palm upon his legs, and looking 
at it between whiles. “ Is your other hand at all 
cleaner ? Much the same. Well, I’ll owe you another 
shake. We’ll suppose it done, if you’ve no objection.” 

Hugh laughed again, and with such thorough aban- 
donment to his mad humor, that his limbs seemed dis- 
located, and his whole frame in danger of tumbling to 
pieces ; but Mr. Tappertit, so far from receiving this 
extreme merriment with any irritation, was pleased to 
regard it with the utmost favor, and even to join in it, so 
far as one of his gravity and station could, with any 
regard to that decency and decorum which men in high 
places are expected to maintain. 

Mr. Tappertit did not stop here, as many public char- 
acters might have done, but calling up his brace of lieu- 
tenants, introduced Hugh to them with high commenda- 
tion : declaring him to be a man who, at such times as 
hose in which they lived, could not be too much cher- 
ished. Further, he did him the honor to remark, that 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


129 


he would be an acquisition of which even the United 
Bulldogs might be proud ; and finding, upon sounding 
him, that he was quite ready and willing to enter the 
society (for he was not at all particular, and would have 
leagued himself that night with anything, or anybody, 
for any purpose whatsoever), caused the necessary pre- 
liminaries to be gone into upon the spot. This tribute 
to his great merit delighted no man more than Mr. Den- 
nis, as he himself proclaimed with several rare and sur- 
prising oaths ; and indeed it gave unmingled satisfaction 
to the whole assembly. 

“ Make anything you like of me ! ” cried Hugh, flour- 
ishing the can he had emptied more than once. “ Put 
me on any duty you please. Tin your man. I’ll do it. 
Here’s my captain — here’s my leader. Ha, ha, ha 1 
Let him give me the word of command, and I’ll fight the 
whole Parliament House single-handed, or set a lighted 
torch to the King’s Throne itself! With that, he smote 
Mr. Tappertit on the back with such violence that his 
little body seemed to shrink into a mere nothing ; and 
roared again until the very foundlings near, at hand were 
startled in their beds. 

- In fact, a sense of something whimsical in their com- 
panionship seemed to have taken entire possession of his 
rude brain. The bare fact of being patronized by a 
great man whom he could have crushed with one hand, 
appeared in his eyes so eccentric and humorous, that a 
kind of ferocious merriment gained the mastery over 
him, and quite subdued his brutal nature. He roared 
and roared again ; toasted Mr. Tappertit a hundred 
times ; declared himself a Bulldog to the core ; and 
vowed to be faithful to him to the last drop of blood 
•n his veins. 


VOL. II. 


130 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


All these compliments Mr. Tappertit received as mat- 
ters of course — flattering enough in their way, but 
entirely attributable to his vast superiority. His digni- 
fied self-possession only delighted Hugh the more ; and 
in a word, this giant and dwarf struck up a friendship 
which bade fair to be of long continuance, as the one 
held it to be his right to command, and the other con- 
sidered it an exquisite pleasantry to obey. Nor was 
Hugh by any means a passive follower, who scrupled to 
act without precise and definite orders; for when Mr. 
Tappertit mounted on an empty cask which stood by 
way of rostrum in the room, and volunteered a speech 
upon the alarming crisis then at hand, he placed himself 
beside the orator, and though he grinned from ear to ear 
at every word he said, threw out such expressive hints 
to scoffers in the management of his cudgel, that those 
who were at first the most disposed to interrupt, became 
remarkably attentive, and were the loudest in their ap- 
probation. 

It was not all noise and jest, however, at The Boot, 
nor were the whole party listeners to the speech. There 
were some men at the other end of the room (which was 
a long, low-roofed chamber) in earnest conversation all 
the time ; and when any of this group went out, fresh 
people were sure to come in soon afterwards and sit 
down in their places, as though the others had relieved 
them on some watch or duty ; which it was pretty clear 
they did, for these changes took place by the clock, at 
intervals of half an hour. These persons whispered 
very much among themselves, and kept aloof, and often 
looked round, as jealous of their speech being overheard; 
some two or three among them entered in books what 
seemed to be reports from the others ; when they were 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


131 


not thus employed, one of them would turn to the news- 
papers which were strewn upon the table, and from the 
St. James’s Chronicle, the Herald, Chronicle, or Public 
Advertiser, would read to the rest in a low voice some 
passage having reference to the topic in which they were 
all so deeply interested. But the great attraction was a 
pamphlet called The Thunderer, which espoused their 
own opinions, and was supposed at that time to emanate 
directly from the Association. This was always in re- 
quest ; and whether read aloud, to an eager knot of 
listeners, or by some solitary man, was certain to be 
followed by stormy talking and excited looks. 

In the midst of all his merriment, and admiration of 
his captain, Hugh was made sensible by these and other 
tokens, of the presence of an air of mystery, akin to 
that which had so much impressed him out of doors. It 
was impossible to discard a sense that something serious 
was going on, and that under the noisy revel of the 
public-house, there lurked unseen and dangerous matter. 
Little affected by this, however, he was perfectly satisfied 
with his quarters, and would have remained there till 
morning, but that his conductor rose soon after midnight, 
to go home ; Mr. Tappertit following his example, left 
him no excuse to stay. So they all three left the house 
together : roaring a No-Popery song until the fields re- 
sounded with the dismal noise. 

“ Cheer up, captain ! ” cried Hugh, when they had 
roared themselves out of breath. “ Another stave ! ” 

Mr. Tappertit, nothing loath, began again ; and so the 
three went staggering on, arm-in-arm, shouting like mad- 
men, and defying the watch with great valor. Indeed 
this did not require any unusual bravery or boldness, as 
the watchmen of that time, being selected for the office 


132 


BAKNABY BUDGE. 


on account of excessive age and extraordinary infirmity, 
had a custom of shutting themselves up tight in their 
boxes on the first symptoms of disturbance, and remain- 
ing there until they disappeared. In these proceedings, 
Mr. Dennis, who had a gruff voice and lungs of consider- 
able power, distinguished himself very much, and ac- 
quired gi'eat credit with his two companions. 

“ What a queer fellow you are ! ” said Mr. Tappertit. 

You’re so precious sly and close. Why don’t you ever 
tell what trade you’re of? ” 

“ Answer the captain instantly,” cried Hugh, beating 
his hat down on his head ; “ why don’t you ever tell 
what trade you’re of ? ” 

“ I’m of as gen-teel a calling, brother, as any man in 
England — as light a business as any gentleman could 
desire.” 

“ Was you ’prenticed to it ? ” asked Mr. Tappertit. 

“ No. Natural genius,” said Mr. Dennis. “ No ’pren- 
ticing. It come by natur’. Muster Gashford knows my 
calling. Look at that hand of mine — many and many 
a job that hand has done, with a neatness and dex- 
terity, never known afore. When I look at that hand,” 
said Mr. Dennis, shaking it in the air, “and remember 
the helegant bits of work it has turned off, I feel quite 
molloncholy to think it should ever grow old and feeble. 
But sich is life ! ” 

He heaved a deep sigh as he indulged in these reflec- 
tions, and putting his fingers with an absent air on Hugh’s 
throat, and particularly under his left ear, as if he were 
studying the anatomical development of that part of his 
frame, shook his head in a despondent manner and actu- 
ally shed tears. 

“ You’re a kind of artist, I suppose — eh ! ” said Mr 
Tappertit. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


133 


^ Yes,” rejoined Dennis ; “ yes — I may call myself a 
artist — a fancy workman — art improves natur’ — that’s 
my motto.” v 

“ And what do you call this ? ” said Mr. Tappertit 
taking his stick out of his hand. 

“ That’s my portrait atop,” Dennis replied ; “ d’ye 
think it’s like ? ” 

“ Why — it’s a little too handsome,” said Mr. Tap- 
pertit. ‘‘Who did it? You?” 

“ I ! ” repeated Dennis, gazing fondly on his image. 
“ I wish I had the talent. That was carved by a friend 
of mine, as is now no more. The very day afore he 
died, he cut that with his pocket-knife from memory ! 
‘ I’ll die game,’ says my friend, ‘ and my last moments 
shall be dewoted to making Dennis’s picter.’ That’s it.” 

“ That was a queer fancy, wasn’t it ? ” said Mr. Tap- 
pertit. 

“ It was a queer fancy,” rejoined the other, breathing 
on his fictitious nose, and polishing it with the cuff of his 
coat, “ but he was a queer subject altogether — a kind 
of gypsy — one of the finest, stand-up men, you ever see. 
Ah ! He told me some things that would startle you a 
bit, did that friend of mine, on the morning when he 
i died.” 

{ “ You were with him at the time, were you ? ” said 

i Mr. Tappertit. 

I “ Yes,” he answered with a curious look, “ I was 

II there. Oh ! yes certainly, I was there. He wouldn’t 
i have gone off half as comfortable without me. I had 
I been with three or four of his family under the same 

circumstances. They were all fine fellows.” 

“ They must have been fond of you,” remarked Mr. 
I Tappertit, looking at him sideways. 


134 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ I don’t know that they was exactly fond of me,” said 
Dennis, with a little hesitation, “ but they all had me 
near ’em when they departed. I come in for their ward- 
robes too. This very handkecher that you see round my 
neck, belonged to him that I’ve been speaking of — him 
as did that likeness.” 

Mr. Tappertit glanced at the article referred to, and 
appeared to think that the deceased’s ideas of dress were 
of a peculiar and by no means an expensive kind. He 
made no remark upon the point, however, and suffered 
his mysterious companion to proceed without interrup- 
tion. 

“ These smalls,” said Dennis, rubbing his legs ; “ these 
very smalls — they belonged to a friend of mine that’s 
left off sich incumbrances forever: this coat too — I’ve 
often walked behind this coat, in the streets, and won- 
dered whether it would ever come to me : this pair of 
shoes have danced a hornpipe for another man, afore my 
eyes, full half a dozen times at least : and as to my hat,” 
he said, taking it off, and whirling it round upon his fist 

— “ Lord ! I’ve seen this hat go up Holborn on the box 
of a hackney-coach — ah, many and many a day ! ” 

“ You don’t mean to say their old wearers are all dead, 
I hope ? ” said Mr. Tappertit, falling a little distance from 
him, as he spoke. 

“ Every one of ’em,” replied Dennis. “ Every man 
Jack ! ” 

There was something so very ghastly in this circum- 
stance, and it appeared to account, in such a very strange 
and dismal manner, for his faded dress — which, in this 
new aspect, seemed discolored by the earth from graves 

— that Mr. Tappertit abruptly found he was going 
another way, and, stopping short, bade him good-night 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


13 ;') 

with the utmost heartiness. As they happened to be 
near the Old Bailey, and Mr. Dennis knew there were 
turnkeys in the lodge with whom he could pass the 
night, and discuss professional subjects of common inter- 
est among them before a rousing fire, and over a social 
glass, he separated from his companions without any 
great regret, and warmly shaking hands with Hugh, and 
making an early appointment for their meeting at The 
Boot, left them to pursue their road. 

^ That’s a strange sort of man,” said Mr. Tappertit, 
w atching the hackney-coachman’s hat as it went bobbing 
down the street. “ I don’t know what to make of him. 
Why can’t he have his smalls made to order, or wear 
live clothes at any rate ? ” 

“ He’s a lucky man, captain,” cried Hugh. “ I should 
like to have such friends as his.” 

“ I hope he don’t get ’em to make their wills, and 
then knock ’em on the head,” said Mr. Tappertit, mus- 
ing. “ But come. The United B.’s expect me. On ! 
— What’s the matter.?” 

“ I quite forgot,” said Hugh, who had started at the 
striking of a neighboring clock. “ I have somebody to 
see to-night — I must turn back directly. The drinking 
and singing put it out of my head. It’s well I remem- 
bered it ! ” 

Mr. Tappertit looked at him as though he were about 
to give utterance to some very majestic sentiments in 
reference to this act of desertion, but as it was clear, 
from Hugh’s hasty manner, that the engagement was 
one of a pressing nature, he graciously forbore, and 
gave him his permission to depart immediately, which 
Hugh acknowledged with a roar of laughter. 

“ Good-night, captain ! ” he cried. “ I am yours to 
the death, remember ! ” 


136 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ Farewell ! ” said Mr. Tappertit, waving his hand 
“ Be bold and vigilant ! ” 

“ No Popery, captain ! ” roared Hugh. 

“ England in blood first ! ” cried his desperate leader. 
Whereat Hugh cheered and laughed, and ran off like a 
greyhound. 

“ That man will prove a credit to my corps,” said 
Simon, turning thoughtfully upon his heel. “ And let 
me see. In an altered state of society — which must 
ensue if we break out and are victorious — when the 
locksmith’s child is mine, Miggs must be got rid of 
somehow, or she’ll poison the tea-kettle one evening 
when I’m out. He might marry Miggs, if he was 
drunk enough. It shall be done. I’ll make a note of 
it.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


137 


CHAPTER XL. 

Little thinking of the plan for his happy settlement 
in life which had suggested itself to the teeming brain 
of his provident commander, Hugh made no pause until 
Saint Dunstan’s giants struck the hour above him, when 
he worked the handle of a pump which stood hard-by, 
with great vigor, and thrusting his head under the spout, 
let the water gush upon him until a little stream ran 
down from every uncombed hair, and he was wet to 
the waist. Considerably refreshed by this ablution, both 
in mind and body, and almost sobered for the time, he 
dried himself as he best could ; then crossed the road, 
and plied the knocker of the Middle Temple gate. 

The night-porter looked through a small grating in 
the portal with a surly eye, and cried “ Halloa ! ” which 
greeting Hugh returned in kind, and bade him open 
quickly. 

“We don’t sell beer here,” cried the man ; “ what 
else do you want?” 

“ To come in,” Hugh replied, with a kick at the 
door. 

“ Where to go to ? ” 

“ Paper-Buildings.” 

“ Whose chambers ? ” 

“ Sir John Chester’s.” Each of which answers, he 
emphasized with another kick. 

After a little growling on the other side, the gate was 


138 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


opened, and lie passed in : undergoing a close inspec- 
tion from the porter as he did so. 

“ You wanting Sir John, at this time of night ! ” said 
the man. 

“ Ay ! ” said Hugh. “ I ! What of that ? ” 

“ Why, [ must go with you and see that you do, for I 
don’t believe it.” 

“ Come along then.” 

Eying him with suspicious looks, the man, with key 
and lantern, walked on at his side, and attended' him 
to Sir John Chester’s door, at which Hugh gave one 
knock, that echoed through the dark staircase like a 
ghostly summons, and made the dull light tremble in 
the drowsy lamp. 

“ Do you think he wants me now ? ” said Hugh. 

Before the man had time to answer, a footstep was 
heard within, a light appeared, and Sir John, in his 
dressing-gown and slippers, opened the door. 

“ I ask your pardon. Sir John,” said the porter pull- 
ing off his hat. “ Here’s a young man says he wants to 
speak to you. It’s late for strangers. I thought it best 
to see that all was right.” 

“ Aha ! ” cried Sir John, raising his eyebrows. “ It’s 
you, messenger, is it? Go in. Quite right, friend, I 
commend your prudence highly. Thank you. God 
bless you. Good-night.” 

To be commended, thanked, God-blessed, and bade 
good-night by one who carried “ Sir ” before his name, 
and wrote himself M.F. to boot, was something for a 
porter. He withdrew with much humility* and rev- 
erence. Sir John followed his late visitor into the 
dressing-room, and sitting in his easy-chair before the 
Ore, and moving it so that he could see him as he 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


139 


stood hat in hand, beside the door, looked at him from 
head to foot. 

The old face, calm and pleasant as ever ; the com- 
plexion, quite juvenile in its bloom and clearness; the 
same smile ; the wonted pi*ecision and elegance of dress : 
the white, well-ordered teeth ; the delicate hands ; the 
composed and quiet manner ; everything as it used to 
be : no marks of age or passion, envy, hate, or dis- 
content : all unruffled and serene, and quite, delightful 
to behold. 

He wrote himself M.P. — but how ? Why thus. It 
was a proud family — more proud, indeed, than wealthy. 
He had stood in danger of arrest ; of bailiffs, and a jail 
— a vulgar jail, to which the common people with small 
incomes went. Gentlemen of ancient houses have no 
privilege of exemption from such cruel laws — unless 
they are of one great house, and then they have. A 
proud man of his stock and kindred had the means of 
sending him there. He offered — not indeed to pay 
his debts, but to let him sit for a close borough until 
his own son came of age, which, if he lived, would 
come to pass in twenty years. It was quite as good 
as an Insolvent Act, and infinitely more genteel. So 
Sir John Chester was a member of Parliament. 

But how Sir John ? Nothing so simple, or so easy. 
One touch with a sword of state, and the transformation 
is effected. John Chester, Esquire, M. P., attended 
court — went up with an address — headed a deputa- 
tion. Such elegance of manner, so many graces of de- 
portment, such powers of conversation, could never pass 
unnoticed. Mr. was too common for such merit. A 
man so gentlemanly should have been — but Fortune is 
capricious — born a Duke: just as some dukes should 


140 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


have been born laborers. He caught the fancy of the 
king, knelt down a grub and rose a butterfly. John 
Cliester, Esquire, Avas knighted and became Sir John. 

“ I thought when you left me this evening, my es- 
teemed acquaintance,” said Sir John after a pretty long 
silence, “that you intended to return with all despatch?” 

“ So I did, Master.” 

“ And so you have ? ” he retorted, glancing at his 
watch. “ Is that what you would say ? ” 

Instead of replying, Hugh changed the leg on which he 
leant, shuffled his cap from one hand to the other, looked 
at the ground, the wall, the ceiling, and finally at Sir 
John himself ; before whose pleasant face he lowered his 
eyes again, and fixed them on the floor. 

“ And how have you been employing yourself in the 
mean while?” quoth Sir John, lazily crossing his legs. 
“ Where have you been ? wbat harm have you been 
doing ? ” 

“No harm at all. Master,” growled Hugh, with humil- 
ity. “ I have only done as you ordered.” 

“As I what'^^^ returned Sir John. 

“ Well then,” said Hugh uneasily, “ as you advised, or 
said I ought, or said I might, or said that you would do, 
if you was me. Don’t be so hard upon me, master.” 

Something like an expression of triumph in the per- 
fect control he had established over this rough instru- 
ment, appeared in the knight’s face for an instant ; but 
it vanished directly, as he said — paring his nails while 
speaking: — 

“ When you say I ordered you, my good fellow, you 
imply that I directed you to do something for me — 
something I wanted done — something for my own ends 
^nd purposes — you see ? Now I am sure I needn’t 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


141 


enlarge upon the extreme absurdity of such an idea, 
however unintentional ; so, please ” — and here he 
turned his eyes upon him — “ to be more guarded. Will 
you ? ” 

“ I meant to give you no offence,” said Hugh. “ 1 
don’t know what to say. You catch me up so ver} 
short.” 

“ You will be caught up much shorter, my good friend 

— infinitely shorter — one of these days, depend upon 
it,” replied his patron, calmly. “ By the by, instead of 
wondering why you have been so long, my wonder 
should be wjiy you came at all. Why did you ? ” 

“ You know, master,” said Hugh, “ that I couldn’t 
read the bill I found, and that supposing it to be some- 
thing particular from the way it was wrapped up, I 
brought it here.” 

“ And could you ask no one else to read it. Bruin ? ” 
said Sir John. 

“ No one that I could trust with secrets, master. 
Since Barnaby Budge was lost sight of for good and all 

— and that’s five year ago — I haven’t talked with any 
one but you.” 

“ You have done me honor, I am sure.” 

“ I have come to and fro, master, all through that 
time, when there was anything to tell, because I knew 
that you’d be angry with me if I stayed away,” said 
Hugh, blurting the words out, after an embarrassed 
silence ; “ and because I wished to please you, if I 
could, and not to have you go against me. There. 
That’s the true reason why I came to-night. You know 
. that, master, I am sure.” 

“ You are a specious fellow,” returned Sir John, fixing 
his eyes upon him, “ and carry two faces under youi 


142 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


hood, as well as the best. Didn’t you give me in this 
room, this evening, any other reason ; no dislike of any- 
body who has slighted you, lately, on all occasions, 
abused you, treated you with rudeness; acted towards 
you, more as if you were a mongrel dog than a man 
like himself?” 

“ To be sure I did ! ” cried Hugh, his passion rising, 
as the other meant it should ; “ and I say it all over 
now, again. I’d do anything to have some revenge on 
him — anything. And when you told me that he and 
all the Catholics would suffer from those who joined to- 
gether under that handbill, I said I’d mal^e one of ’em, 
if their master was the devil himself. I am one of ’em. 
See whether I am as good as my word and turn out to 
be among the foremost, or no. I mayn’t have much 
head, master, but I’ve had enough to remember those 
that use me ill. You shall see, and so shall he, and so 
shall hundreds more, how my spirit backs me when the 
time comes. My bark is nothing to my bite. Some that 
I know, had better have a wild lion among ’em than me, 
when I am fairly loose — they had ! ” 

The knight looked at him with a smile of far deeper 
meaning than ordinary ; and pointing to the old cup- 
board, followed him with his eyes while he filled and 
drank a glass of liquor ; and smiled when his back was 
turned, with deeper meaning yet. 

“ You are in a blustering mood, my friend,” he said, 
when Hugh confronted him again. 

“ Not I, master ! ” cried Hugh. “ I don’t say half I 
-nean. I can’t. I haven’t got the gift. There are 
talkers enough among us ; I’ll be one of the doers ” 

“ Oh ! you have joined those fellows then ? ” said Sir 
Tohn, with an air of most profound indifference. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


14S 


“Yes. I went up to the house you told me of, and 
got put down upon the muster. There was another man 
there named Dennis ” — 

“ Dennis, eh ! ” cried Sir John, laughing. “ Ay, ay 
a pleasant fellow, I believe ? ” 

“ A roaring dog, master — one after my own heart — 
hot upon the matter too — red-hot.” 

“ So I have heard,” replied Sir John carelessly. “ You 
don’t happen to know his trade, do you ? ” 

“ He wouldn’t say,” cried Hugh. “ He keeps it secret.” 

“ Ha, ha ! ” laughed Sir John. “ A strange fancy — 
a weakness with some persons — you’ll know it one day, 
I dare swear.” 

“We’re intimate already,” said Hugh. 

“ Quite natural ! And have been drinking together, 
eh ? ” pursued Sir John. “ Did you say what place you 
went to in company, when you left Lord George’s ? ” 

Hugh had not said or thought of saying, but he told 
him ; and this inquiry being followed by a long train of 
questions, he related all that had passed both in and out 
of doors, the kind of people he had seen, their numbers, 
state of feeling, mode of conversation, apparent expecta- 
tions and intentions. His questioning was so artfully 
contrived, that he seemed even in his own eyes to volun- 
teer all this information rather than to have it wrested 
from him ; and he was brought to this state of feeling so 
naturally, than when Mr. Chester yawned at length and 
declared himself quite wearied out, he made a rough kind 
of excuse for having talked so much. 

“ There — get you gone,” said Sir John, holding the 
door open in his hand. “You have made a pretty even- 
Yig’s work. I told you not to do this. You may get 
into trouble. You’ll have an opportunity of revenging 


144 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


yourself on your proud friend Haredale, though, and for 
that, you’d hazard anything T suppose ? ” 

“I would,” retorted Hugh, stopping in his passage out 
and looking back ; “ but what do I risk ! What do 1 
stand a chance of losing, master? Friends, home? A 
fig for ’em all ; I have none ; they are nothing to me. 
Give me a good scufiie ; let me pay off old scores in a 
bold riot where there are men to stand by me ; and then 
use me as you like — it don’t matter much to me what 
the end is ! ” 

“What have you done with that paper?” said Sir 
John. 

“ I have it here, master.” 

“ Drop it again as you go along ; it’s as well not to 
keep such things about you.” 

Hugh nodded, and touching his cap with an air of as 
much respect as he could summon up, departed. 

Sir John, fastening the doors behind him, went back 
to his dressing-room, and sat down once again before the 
fire, at which he gazed for a long time, in earnest medi- 
tation. 

“ This happens fortunately,” he said, breaking into a 
smile, “and promises well. Let me see. My relative 
and I, who are the most Protestant fellows in the world, 
give our worst wishes to the Roman Catholic cause ; and 
to Saville, who introduces their bill, I have a personal 
objection besides ; but as each of us has himself for the 
first article in his creed, we cannot commit ourselves by 
joining with a very extravagant madman, such as this 
Gordon most undoubtedly is. Now really, to foment his 
disturbances in secret, through the medium of such a 
very apt instrument as my savage friend here, may 
•urther our real ends; and to express at all becoming 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


145 


seasons, in moderate and polite terms, a disapprobation 
of his proceedings, though we agree with him in prin- 
ciple, will certainly be to gain a character for honesty 
and uprightness of purpose, which cannot fail to do us 
infinite service,- and to raise us into some importance. 
Good ! So much for public grounds. As to private 
considerations, I confess that if these vagabonds would 
make some riotous demonstration (which does not ap- 
pear impossible), and would inflict some little chastise- 
ment on Haredale as a not inactive man among his sect, 
it would be extremely agreeable to my feelings, and 
would amuse me beyond measure. Good again ! Per- 
haps better ! ” 

When he came to this point, he took a pinch of snuff ; 
then beginning slowly to undress, he resumed his medi- 
tations, by saying with a smile : 

“ I fear, I do fear exceedingly, that my friend is fol- 
lowing fast in the footsteps of his mother. His intimacy 
with Mr. Dennis is very ominous. But I have no doubt 
he must have come to that end any way. If I lend him 
a helping hand, the only difference is, that he may, upon 
the whole, possibly drink a few gallons, or puncheons, or 
hoorsheads, less in this life than he otherwise would. It^s 
no business of mine. It’s a matter of very small im- 
portance ! ” 

So he took another pinch of snuff, and went to bed. 


vou n. 


10 


146 


BARNABY RIJDGE. 


CHAPTER XLL 

From the workshop of the Golden Key, there issued 
forth a tinkling sound, so merry and good-humored, that 
it suggested the idea of some one working blithely, and 
made quite pleasant music. No man who hammered on 
at a dull monotonous duty, could have brought such 
cheerful notes from steel and iron ; none but a chirping, 
healthy, honest-hearted fellow, who made the best of 
everything, and felt kindly towards everybody, could 
have done it for an instant. He might have been a cop- 
persmith, and still been musical. If he had sat in a 
jolting wagon, full of rods of iron, it seemed as if he 
would have brought some harmony out of it. 

Tink, tink, tink — clear as a silver bell, and audible at 
every pause of the streets’ harsher noises, as though it 
said, “ I don’t care ; nothing puts me out ; I am resolved 
to be happy.” Women scolded, children squalled, heavy 
carts went rumbling by, horrible cries proceeded from 
the lungs of hawkers ; still it struck in again, no higher, 
no lower, no louder, no softer ; not thrusting itself on 
people’s notice a bit the more for having been outdone 
by louder sounds — tink, tink, tink, tink, tink. 

It was a perfect embodiment of the still small voice, 
free from all cold, hoarseness, huskiness, or, unhealthi- 
ness of any kind ; foot-passengers slackened their pace, 
and were disposed to linger near it ; neighbors who had 
got up splenetic that morning, felt good-humor stealing 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


’ 147 


on them as they heard it, and by degrees became quite* 
sprightly ; mothers danced their babies to its ringing ; 
still the same magical tink, tink, tink, came gayly from 
the workshop of the Golden Key. 

Who but the locksmith could have made such music / 
A gleam of sun shining through the unsashed window 
and checkering the dark workshop with a broad patch 
of light, fell full upon him, as though attracted by his 
sunny heart. There he stood working at his anvil, his 
face all radiant with exercise and gladness, his sleeves 
turned up, his wig pushed off his shining forehead — the 
easiest, freest, happiest man in all the world. Beside 
him sat a sleek cat, purring and winking in the light, 
and falling every now and then into an idle doze, as 
from excess of comfort. Toby looked on from a tall 
bench hard by ; one beaming smile, from his broad nut- 
brown face down to the slack-baked buckles in his shoes. 
The very locks that hung around had something jovial 
in their rust, and seemed like gouty gentlemen of hearty 
natures, disposed to joke on their infirmities. There 
was nothing surly or severe in the whole scene. It 
seemed impossible that any one of the innumerable keys 
could fit a churlish strong-box or a prison-door. Cel- 
lars of beer and wine, rooms where there were fires, 
books, gossip, and cheering laughter — these were their 
proper sphere of action. Places of distrust and cruel- 
ty, and restraint, ^hey would have left quadruple-locked 
forever. 

Tink, tink, tink. The locksmith paused at last, and 
wiped his brow. The silence roused the cat, who, jump- 
ing softly down, crept to the door, and watched with 
‘iger eyes a bird-cage in an opposite window. Gabriel 
lifted Toby to his mouth, and took a hearty draught. 


148 ^ 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Then, as he stood upright, with his head flung back, 
and his portly chest thrown out, you would have seen 
that Gabriel’s lower man was clothed in military gear. 
Glancing at the wall beyond, there might have been es- 
pied, hanging on their several pegs, a cap and feather, 
broadsword, sash, and coat of scarlet; which any man 
learned in such matters would have known from their 
make and pattern to be the uniform of a sergeant in the 
Royal East-London Volunteers. 

As the locksmith put his mug down, empty, on the 
bench, whence it had smiled on him before, he glanced 
at these articles with a laughing eye, and looking at 
them with his head a little on one side, as though he 
would get them all into a focus, said, leaning on his ham- 
mer : 

“ Time was, now, I remember, when I was like to run 
mad with the desire to wear a coat of that color. If any 
one (except my father) had called me a fool for my 
pains, how I should have fired and fumed ! But what a 
fool I must have been, sure-ly ! ” 

“ Ah !” sighed Mrs. Yarden, who had entered unob- 
served. “ A fool indeed. A man at your time of life, 
Varden, should know better now.” 

“ Why, what a ridiculous woman you are, Martha,” 
said the locksmith, turning round with a smile. 

“ Certainly,” replied Mrs. V. with great demureness. 

Of course I am. I know that, Varden. Thank you.” 
f “ I mean ” — began the locksmith. 

“ Yes,” said his wife, “ I know what you mean. You 
speak quite plain enough to be understood, Varden. .It’s 
very kind of you to adapt yourself to my capacity, I am 
lure.” 

“ Tut, tut, Martha,” rejoined the locksmith ; “ don’t 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


149 


take offence at nothing. I mean, how strange it is of 
you to run down volunteering, when it’s done to defend 
you and all the other women, and our own fireside and 
everybody else’s, in case of need.” 

“ It’s unchristian,” cried Mrs. Varden, shaking her 
head. 

“ Unchristian ! ” said the locksmith. “ Why what the 
devil ” — 

Mrs. Varden looked at the ceiling, as in expectation 
that the consequence of this profanity would be the im- 
mediate descent of the four-post bedstead on the second 
floor, together with the best sitting-room on the first; 
but no visible judgment occurring, she heaved a deep 
sigh, and begged her husband, in a tone of resignation, 
to go on, and by all means to blaspheme as much as pos- 
sible, because he knew she liked it. 

The locksmith did for a moment seem disposed to 
gratify her, but he gave a great gulp, and mildly re- 
joined : 

“ I was going to say, what on earth do you call it un- 
christian for ? Which would be most unchristian, Mar- 
tha — to sit quietly down and let our houses be sacked 
by a foreign army, or to turn out like men and drive ’em 
off? Shouldn’t I be a nice sort of a Christian, if I 
crept into a corner of my own chimney and looked on 
while a parcel of whiskered savages bore off Dolly — or 
vou ? ” 

When he said “ or you,” Mrs. Varden, despite herself, 
relaxed into a smile. There was something compliment- 
ary in the idea. “ In such a state of things as that, in- 
deed ” — she simpered, 

“ As that ! ” repeated the locksmith. “ Well, that 
would be the state of things directly. Even Miggs 


150 


BAKNABY RUDGE. 


would go. Some black tambourine-player, with a great 
turban on, would be bearing her off, and unless the 
tambourine-player was proof against kicking and scratch- 
ing, it’s my belief he’d have the worst of it. Ha, ha, 
ha ! I’d forgive the tambourine-player. I wouldn’t have 
him interfered with on any account, poor fellow.” And 
here the locksmith laughed again so heartily, that tears 
came into his eyes — much to Mrs. Varden’s indignation, 
who thought the capture of so sound lu Protestant and ^ 
estimable a private character as Miggs by a pagan 
negro, a circumstance too shocking and awful for con- 
templation. 

The picture Gabriel had drawn, indeed, threatened 
serious consequences, and would indubitably have led 
to them, but luckily at that moment a light footstep 
crossed the threshold, and Dolly, running in, threw' her 
arms round her old father’s neck and hugged him 
tight. 

“ Here she is at last ! ” cried Gabriel. “ And how 
well you look, Doll, and how late you are, my dar- 
ling!” 

How well she looked ? Well ? Why, if he had ex- 
hausted every laudatory adjective in the dictionary, it 
W'ouldn’t have been praise enough. When and where 
was there ever such a plump, roguish, comely, bright- 
eyed, enticing, bewitching, captivating, maddening little 
puss in all this world, as Dolly ! What wms the Dollj 
of five years ago, to the Dolly of that day ! How man) 
coach-makers, saddlers, cabinet-makers, and professors of 
other useful arts, had deserted their fathers, mothers 
sisters, brothers, and, most of all, their cousins, for the 
love of her ! How many unknown gentlemen — sup- 
posed to be of mighty fortunes, if not titles — had waited 


BAKNABY KUDGE. 


151 


round the corner after dark, and tempted Miggs the in- 
corruptible, with golden guineas, to deliver offers of mar- 
riage folded up in love-letters ! How many disconsolate 
fathers and substantial tradesmen had waited on the lock- 
smith for the same purpose, with dismal tales of how 
their sons had lost their appetites, and taken to shut 
themselves up in dark bedrooms, and wandering in deso- 
late suburbs with pale faces, and all because of Dolly 
Varden’s loveliness and cruelty ! How many young 
men, in all previous times of unprecedented steadiness, 
had turned suddenly wild and wicked for the same rea- 
son, and, in an ecstasy of unrequited love, taken to 
wrench off door-knockers, and invert the boxes of 
rheumatic watchmen ! How had she recruited the 
king’s service, both by sea and land, through render- 
ing desperate his loving subjects between the ages of 
eighteen and twenty-five ! How many young ladies had 
publicly professed with tears in their eyes, that for their 
tastes she was much too short, too tall, too bold, too cold, 
too stout, too thin, too fair, too dark — too everything but 
liandsome ! How many old ladies, taking counsel to- 
gether, had thanked Heaven their daughters were not 
like her, and had hoped she might come to no harm, and 
had thought she would come to no good, and had won- 
dered what people saw in her, and had arrived at the 
conclusion that she was “going off” in her looks, or 
had never come on in them, and that she was a thorough 
imposition and a popular mistake ! 

And yet here was this same Dolly Varden, so whim- 
sical and hard to please that she was Dolly Varden still, 
all smiles and dimples, and pleasant looks, and caring no 
more for the fifty or sixty young fellows wno at that 
very moimait were breaking their hearts to marry her, 


152 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


than if so many oysters had been crossed in love and 
opened afterwards. 

Dolly hugged her father as has been already stated, 
and having hugged her mother also, accompanied both 
into the little parlor where the cloth was already laid for 
dinner, and where Miss Miggs — a trifle more rigid and 
bony than of yore — received her with a sort of hys- 
terical gasp, intended for a smile. Into the hands of 
that young virgin, she delivered her bonnet and walk- 
ing dress (all of a dreadful, artful, and designing kind), 
and then said with a laugh, which rivalled .the lock- 
smith’s music, “ How glad I always am to be at home 
again ! ” 

“ And how glad we always are, Doll,” said her father, 
putting back the dark hair from her sparkling eyes, “• to 
have you at home. Give me a kiss.” 

If there had been anybody of the male kind there 
to see her do it — but there was not — it was a 
mercy. 

“ I don’t like your being at the Warren,” said the lock- 
smith, “ I can’t bear to have you out of my sight. And 
what is the news over yonder, Doll ? ” 

“ What new'S there is, I think you know already,” re- 
plied his daughter. “ I am sure you do, though.” • 

“ Ay ? ” cried the locksmith. “ What’s that ? ” 

“ Come, come,” said Dolly, “ you know very well. I 
want you to tell me why Mr. Haredale — oh, how gruF 
he is again, to be sure ! — has been away from home for 
some days past, and why he is travelling about (we 
know he is travelling, because of his letters) without 
telling his owm niece why or wherefore.” 

“ Miss Emma doesn’t want to know, I’ll swear,” re- 
urned the locksmith. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


153 


** I don’t know that,” said Dolly ; “ but 1 do, at any 
rate. Do tell me. Why is he so secret, and what is this 
ghost story, which nobody is to tell Miss Emma, and 
which seems to be mixed up with his going away ? Now 
I see you know by your coloring so.” 

“ What the story means, or is, or has to do with it, I 
know no more than you, my dear,” returned the lock- 
smith, “ except that it’s some foolish fear of little Solo- 
mon’s — which has, indeed, no meaning in it, I suppose. 
As to Mr. Haredale’s journey, he goes, as I believe ” — 

“ Yes,” said Dolly. 

“ As I believe,” resumed the locksmith, pinching her 
cheek, “ on business, Doll. What it may be, is quite 
another matter. Read Blue Beard, and don’t be too 
curious, pet ; it’s no business of yours or mine, depend 
upon that ; and here’s dinner, which is much more to 
the purpose.” 

Dolly might have remonstrated against this summary 
dismissal of the subject, notwithstanding the appearance 
of dinner, but at the mention of Blue Beard Mrs. Var- 
den interposed, protesting she could not find it in her 
conscience to sit tamely by, and hear her child recom- 
mended to peruse the adventures of a Turk and Mussul- 
man — far less of a fabulous Turk,- which she consid- 
ered that potentate to be. She held that in such stirring 
and tremendous times as those in which they lived, it 
would be much more to the purpose if Dolly became a 
egular subscriber to the Thunderer, where she would 
nave an opportunity of reading Lord George Gordon’s 
speeches word for word, which would be a greater com- 
'.ort and solace to her, than a hundred and fifty Blue 
Beards ever could impart. She appealed in support of 
Ibis proposition to Miss Miggs, then in waiting, who said 


154 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


that indeed the peace of mind she had derived from the 
perusal of that paper generally, but especially of one 
iirticle of the very last week as ever was, entitled 
Great Britain drenched in gore,” exceeded all belief ; 
the same composition, she added, had also wrought such 
a comforting effect on the mind of a married sister of 
hers, then resident at Golden Lion Court, number twen- 
ty-sivin, second bell-handle on the right hand door-post, 
that, being in a delicate state of health, and, in fact, ex- 
pecting an addition to her family, she had been seized 
with fits directly after its perusal, and had raved of the 
inquisition ever since ; to the great improvement of her 
husband and friends. Miss Miggs went on to say that 
she would recommend all those whose hearts were hal*- 
dened to hear Lord George themselves, whom she com- 
mended first, in respect of his steady Protestantism, then 
of his oratory, then of his eyes, then of his nose, then 
of his legs, and lastly of his figure generally, which she 
looked upon as fit for any statue, prince, or angel, to 
which sentiment Mrs. Vafden fully subscribed. 

Mrs. Varden having cut in, looked at a box upon the 
mantle-shelf, painted in imitation of a very red-brick 
dwelling-house, with a yellow roof ; having at top a real 
chimney, down which voluntary subscribers dropped 
their silver, gold, or pence, into the parlor ; and on the 
door the counterfeit presentment of a brass plate, where- 
on was legibly inscribed “ Protestant Association : ” — 
and looking at it, said, that it was to her a source of 
poignant misery to think that Varden never had, of all 
his substance, dropped anything into that temple, save 
once in secret — as she afterwards discovered — two 
fragments of tobacco-pipe, which she hoped would not be 
put down to his last account. That Dolly, she was 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


155 


grieved to say, was no less backward in her contribu- 
tions, better loving, as it seemed, to purchase ribbons 
and such gauds, than to encourage the great cause, then 
in such lieavy tribulation ; and that she did entreat her 
(her father she much feared could not be moved) not to 
despise, but imitate, the bright example of Miss Miggs, 
who flung her wages, as it were, into the very counte- 
nance of the Pope, and bruised his features with her 
quarter’s money. 

“ Oh, mim,” said Miggs, “ don’t relude to that. I 
had no intentions, mim, that nobody should know. Such 
sacrifices as I can make, are quite a widder’s mite. It’s 
all I have,” cried Miggs, with a great burst of tears — 
for with her they never came on by degrees — “ but 
it’s made up to me in other ways ; it’s well made 
up.” 

This was quite true, though not perhaps in the sense 
that Miggs intended. As she never failed to keep her 
self-denial full in Mrs. Varden’s view, it drew forth so 
many gifts of caps and gowns' and other articles of dress, 
that upon the whole the red-brick house was perhaps the 
best investment for her small capital she could possibly 
have it upon ; returning her interest, at the rate of seven 
or eight per cent, in money, and fifty at least in personal 
repute and credit. 

“You needn’t cry, Miggs,” said Mrs. Varden, herself 
In tears ; “ you needn’t be ashamed of it, though your 
poor mistress is on the same side.” 

Miggs howled at this remark, in a peculiarly dismal 
way, and said she knowed that master hated her. That 
t was a dreadful thing to live in families and have 
lislikes, and not give satisfactions. That to make di- 
visions was a thing she could not abear to think of, 


156 


I^ARNABY RUDGE. 


neither could her feelings let her do it. That if it was 
master’s wishes as she and him should part, it was best 
they should part, and she hoped he might be the hap- 
pier for it, and always wishes him well, and that he 
might find somebody as would meet his dispositions. It 
would be a hard trial, she said, to part from such a 
missis, but she could meet any suffering when her con- 
science told her she was in the rights, and therefore 
she was willing even to go that lengths. She did not 
think, she added, that she could long survive the sep- 
arations, but, as she was hated and looked upon un- 
pleasant, perhaps her dying as soon as possible would 
be the best endings for all parties. With this affecting 
conclusion. Miss Miggs shed more tears, and sobbed 
abundantly. 

“ Can you bear this, Varden ? ” said his wife in a 
solemn voice, laying down her knife and fork. 

“ Why, not very well, my dear,” rejoined the lock- 
smith, “ but I try to keep my temper.” 

“ Don’t let there be words on my account, mim,” 
sobbed Miggs. “ It’s much the best that we should 
part. I wouldn’t stay — oh, gracious me ! — and make 
dissensions, not for a annual gold mine, and found in 
tea and sugar.” 

Lest the reader should be at any loss to discover the 
cause of Miss Miggs’s deep emotion, it may be whispered 
apart that, happening to be listening, as her custom 
sometimes was, when Gabriel and his wife conversed 
together, she had heard the locksmith’s joke relative 
to the foreign black who played the tambourine, and 
bursting with the spiteful feelings which the taunt awoke 
in her fair breast, exploded in the manner we have 
witnessed. Matters having now arrived at a crisis, the 


BARNABY RUDGE 


157 


locksmith, as usual, and for the sake c f peace and quiet- 
ness, gave in. 

“ What are you crying for, girl ? ” he said. “ What’s 
the matter with you ? What are you talking about 
hatred for ? I don’t hate you ; I don’t hate any- 
body. Dry your eyes and make yourself agreeable, 
in Heaven’s name, and let us all be happy while wo 
can.” 

The allied powers deeming it good generalship to 
consider this a sufficient apology on the part of the 
enemy, and confession of having been in the wrong, 
did dry their eyes and take it in good part. Miss 
Miggs observed that she bore no malice, no not to her 
greatest foe, whom she rather loved the more indeed, 
the greater persecution she sustained. Mrs. Varden 
approved of this meek and forgiving spirit in high 
terms, and incidentally declared as a closing article 
of agreement, that Dolly should accompany her to 
the Clerkenwell branch of the association, that very 
night. This was an extraordinary instance of her 
great prudence and policy ; having had this end in 
view from the first, and entertaining a secret misgiving 
that the locksmith (who was bold Avhen Dolly was in 
question) would object, she had backed Miss Miggs up 
to this point, in order that she might have him at a 
disadvantage. The manoeuvre succeeded so well that 
Gabriel only made a wry face, and with the warning 
he had just had, fresh in his mind, did not dare to 
say one word. 

The diflTerence ended, therefore, in Miggs being pre- 
sented with a gown by Mrs. Varden and half a crown 
by Dolly, as if she had eminently distinguished herself 
in the paths of morality and goodness. Mrs. V., ac- 


158 


BARNABY RUBGE. 


cording to custom, expressed her hope that Varden 
would take a lesson from what had passed and learn 
more generous conduct for the time to come ; and the 
dinner being now cold and nobody’s appetite very much 
improved by what had passed, they went on with it, as 
Mrs. Varden said, “ like Christians.” 

As there was to be a grand parade of the Royal 
East London Volunteers that afternoon, the locksmith 
did no more work ; but sat down comfortably with 
his pipe in his mouth, and his arm round his pretty 
daughter’s waist, looking lovingly on Mrs. V., from 
time to time, and exhibiting from the crown of his 
head to the sole of his foot, one smiling surface of 
good-humor. And to be sure, when it w^as time to 
dress him in his regimentals, and Dolly, hanging about 
him in all kinds of graceful winning ways, helped 
to button and buckle and brush him up and get him 
into one of the tightest coats that ever was made by 
mortal tailor, he was the proudest father in all Eng- 
land. 

“ What a handy jade it is ! ” said the locksmith to 
Mrs. Varden, who stood by with folded hands — rather 
proud of her husband too — while Miggs held his cap 
and sword at arm’s length, as if mistrusting that the 
latter might run some one through the body of its 
own accord ; “ but never marry a soldier, Doll, my 
dear.” 

Dolly didn’t ask why not, or say a word, indeed, 
out stooped her head down very low to tie his sash. 

“ I never wear this dress,” said honest Gabriel, “ but 
•I think of poor Joe Willet. I loved Joe ; he was al- 
ways a favorite of mine. Poor Joe ! — Dear heart, my 
girl, don’t tie me in so tight.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


159 


Dolly laughed — not like herself at all — the stran- 
gest little laugh that could be — and held her head 
down lower still. 

I 

“ Poor Joe ! ” returned the locksmith, muttering to 
himself ; “ I always wish he had come to me. I might 
have made it up between them, if he had. Ah ! old 
John made a great mistake in his way of acting by that 
lad — a great mistake. — Have you nearly tied that sash, 
my dear.” 

What an ill-made sash it was ! There it was, loose 
again and trailing on the ground. Dolly was obliged to 
kneel down, and recommence at the beginning. 

“ Never mind young Willet, Varden,” said his wife 
frowning ; “ you might find some one more deserving to 
talk about, I think.” 

Miss Miggs gave a great sniff to the same effect. 

“ Nay, Martha,” cried the locksmith, “ don’t let us 
bear too hard upon him. If the lad is dead indeed, 
we’ll deal kindly by his memory.’,’ 

“ A runaway and a vagabond ! ” said Mrs. Var- 
den. 

Miss Miggs expressed, her concurrence as before. 

“ A runaway, my dear, but not a vagabond,” re- 
turned the locksmith in a gentle tone. “ He behaved 
himself well, did Joe — always — and was a hand- 
some, manly fellow. Don’t call him a vagabond, 
Martha.” 

Mrs. Varden coughed — and so did Miggs. 

“ He tried hard to gain your good opinion, Martha, 
I can tell you,” said the locksmith smiling, and stroking 
his chin. “ Ah ! that he did. It seems but yesterday 
that he followed me out to the Maypole door one night, 
and begged me not to say how like a boy they used him 


160 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


— say here, at home, he meant, though at the time, I 
recollect, I didn’t understand. ‘And how’s Miss Dolly, 
sir ? ’ says Joe,” pursued the locksmith, musing sorrow- 
fully, “Ah! Poor Joe!” 

“ Well, I declare,” cried Miggs. “ Oh ! goodness 
gracious me ! ” 

“ What’s the matter now ? ” said Grabriel, turning 
sharply to her. 

“ Why if here a’n’t Miss Dolly,” said the hand- 
maid, stooping down to look into her face, “ a-giving 
way to floods of tears. Oh mim ! oh sir. Paly it’s 
give me such a turn,” cried the susceptible damsel, 
pressing her hand upon her side to quell the palpita- 
tion of her heart, “ that you might knock me down with 
a feather.” 

The locksmith after glancing at Miss Miggs as if he 
could have wished to have a feather brought straight- 
way, looked on with a broad stare while Dolly hurried 
away, followed by that sympathizing young woman : 
then turning to his wife, stammered out, “ Is Dolly ill ? 
Have I done anything ? Is it my fault ? ” 

“ Your fault ! ” cried Mrs. V. reproachfully. “ There 

— you had better make haste out.” 

“ What have I done ? ” said poor Gabriel. “ It was 
agreed that Mr. Edward’s name was never to be men- 
tioned, and I have not spoken of him, have I ? ” 

Mrs. Varden merely replied that she had no pa- 
tience with him, and bounced off after the other two. 
The unfortunate locksmith wound his sash about him, 
girded on his sword, put on his cap, and walked 
out. 

“ I am not much of a dab at my exercise,” he said 
ander his breath, “but I shall get into fewer scrapes 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


161 


at that work than at this. Every man came into 
the world for something ; my department seems to be 
to make every woman cry without meaning it. It's 
rather hard ! ” 

But he forgot it before he reached the end of the 
street, and went on with a shining face, nodding to the 
neighbors, and showering about his friendly greetings 
like mild spring rain. 


yxn. n. 


11 


162 


BARNABY RUDGK 


CHAPTER XLII. 

The Royal East London Volunteers made a brill* 
iant sight that day : formed into lines, squares, circles, 
triangles, and what not, to the beating of drums and the 
streaming of flags; and performed a vast number of 
complex evolutions, in all of which Sergeant Varden 
bore a conspicuous share. Having displayed their mili- 
tary prowess to the utmost in these warlike shows, they 
marched in glittering order to the Chelsea Bun-house, 
and regaled in the adjacent taverns until dark. Then 
at sound of drum they fell in again, and returned amidst 
the shouting of His Majesty’s lieges to the place from 
whence they came. 

The homeward march being somewhat tardy, — 
owing to the un-soldierlike behavior of certain corporals, 
who being gentlemen of sedentary pursuits in private 
life and excitable out of doors, broke several windows 
with their bayonets, and rendered it imperative on the 
commanding officer to deliver them over to a strong 
guard, with whom they fought at intervals as they came 
along, — it was nine o’clock when the locksmith reached 
home. A hackney-coach was waiting near his door ; 
and as he passed it, Mr. Haredale looked from the win- 
flow and called him by his name. 

“The sight of you is good for sore eyes, sir,” said 
the locksmith, stepping up to him. “ I wish you had 
walked in though, rather than waited here.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


163 


“There is nobody at home, I find,” Mr. Haredale 
answered; “besides, I desired to be as private as I 
could.” , 

“ Humph ! ” muttered the locksmith, looking round 
at his house. “ Gone with Simon Tappertit to that 
precious Branch, no doubt.” 

Mr. Haredale invited him to come into the coach, 
and, if he were not tired or anxious to go home, to ride 
with him a little way that they might have some talk 
together. Gabriel cheerfully complied, and the coach- 
man mounting his box drove oflf. 

“ Varden,” said Mr. Haredale, after a minute’s pause, 
“ you will be amazed to hear what errand I am on ; it 
will seem a very strange one.” 

“ I have no doubt it’s a reasonable one, sir, and has a 
meaning in it,” replied the locksmith ; “ or it would not 
be yours at all. Have you just come back to town, sir? ” 

“ But half an hour ago.” 

“ Bringing no news of Barnaby, or his mother ? ” 
said the locksmith dubiously. “ Ah ! you needn’t shake 
your head, sir. It was a wild-goose chase. I feared 
that, from the first. You exhausted all reasonable 
means of discovery when they went away. To begin 
again after so long a time has passed is hopeless, sir 
— quite hopeless.” 

“ Why, where are they ? ” he returned impatiently. 
“ Wliere can they be? Above ground?” 

“ God knows,” rejoined the locksmith, “ many that 1 
knew above it five years ago, have their beds under the 
grass now. And the world is a wide place. It’s a 
hopeless attempt, sir, believe me. We must leave the 
discovery of this mystery, like all others, to time, and 
nccident, and Heaven’s pleasure.” 


1C4 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Varden, my good fellow,” said Mr. Haredale, “ I 
have a deeper meaning in my present anxiety to find 
them out, than you can fathom. It is not a mere whim ; 
it is not the casual revival of my old wishes and de- 
sires; but an earnest, solemn purpose. My thoughts 
and dreams all tend to it, and fix it in my mind. I 
have no rest by day or night ; I have no peace or quiet ; 
T am haunted.” 

His voice was so altered from its usual tones, and 
his manner bespoke so much emotion, that Gabriel, in 
his wonder, could only sit and look towards him in the. 
darkness, and fancy the expression of his face. 

“ Do not ask me,” continued Mr. Haredale, “ to ex- 
plain myself. If I were to do so, you would think me 
the victim of some hideous fancy. It is enough that 
this is so, and that I cannot — no, I cannot — lie quietly 
in my bed, without doing what will seem to you incom- 
prehensible.” 

“ Since when, sir,” said the locksmith after a pause, 
“has this uneasy feeling been upon you?” 

Mr. Haredale hesitated for. some moments, and then 
replied : “ Since the night of the storm. In short, since 
the last nineteenth of March.” 

As though he feared that Varden might express sur- 
prise, or reason with him, he hastily went on : — 

“You will think, I know, I labor under some delu- 
«ion. Perhaps I do. But it is not a morbid one ; it 
is a wholesome action of the mind, reasoning on actual 
occurrences. You know the furniture remains in Mrs. 
Rudge’s house, and that it has been shut up, by my 
orders, since she went away, save once a-week or so, 
when an old neighbor visits it to scare away the rats. 
I am on my way there now.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


165 


“For what purpose?” asked the locksmith. 

“ To pass the night there,” he replied ; “ and not to- 
night alone, but many nights. This is a secret which I 
trust to you in case of any unexpected emergency. You 
will not come, unless in case of strong necessity, to me ; 
from dusk to broad day, I shall be there. Emma, your 
daughter, and the rest, suppose me out of London, as 
I have been until within this hour. Do not undeceive 
them. This is the errand I am bound upon. I know 
I may confide it to you, and I rely upon your question- 
ing me no more at this time.” 

With that, as if to change the theme, he led the 
astounded locksmith back to the night of the Maypole 
highwayman, to the robbery of Edward Chester, to the 
reappearance of the man at Mrs. Rudge’s house, and 
to all the stratige circumstances which afterwards oc- 
curred. He even asked him carelessly about the man’s 
height, his face, his figure, whether he was like any one 
he had ever seen — like Hugh, for instance, or any man 
he had known at any time — and put many questions 
of that sort, which the locksmith, considering them as 
mere devices to engage his attention and prevent his 
expressing the astonishment he felt, answered pretty 
much at random. 

At length, they arrived at the corner of the street in 
which the house stood, where Mr. Haredale, alighting, 
dismissed the coach. “ If you desire to see me safely 
lodged,” he said, turning to the locksmith with a gloomy 
smile, “ you can.” 

Gabriel, to whom all former marvels had been noth- 
ing in comparison with this, followed him along the 
narrow pavement in silence. When they reached the 
door, Mr. Haredale softly opened it witli a key he had 


166 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


about him, and closing it when Varden entered, they 
were lei’t in thorough darkness. 

They groped their way into the ground-floor room. 
Here Mr. Haredale struck a light, and kindled a pocket 
taper he had brought with him for the purpose. It was 
then, when the flame was full upon him, that the lock- 
smith saw for the first time how haggard, pale, and 
changed he looked ; how worn and thin he was ; how 
perfectly his whole appearance coincided with all that 
he had said so strangely as they rode along. It was 
not an unnatural impulse in Gabriel, after what he had 
heard, to note curiously the expression of his eyes. It 
was perfectly collected and rational ; — so much so, 
indeed, that he felt ashamed of his momentary suspi- 
cion, and drooped his own when Mr. Haredale looked 
towards him, as if he feared they would betray his 
thoughts. 

“ Will you walk through the house ? ” said Mr. Hare- 
dale, with a glance towards the window, the crazy shut- 
ters of which were closed and fastened. “ Speak low.” 

There was a kind of awe about the place, which 
would have rendered it difficult to speak in any other 
manner. Gabriel whispered “Yes,” and followed him 
up-stairs. 

Everything was just as they had seen it last. There 
was a sense of closeness from the exclusion of fresh air, 
and a gloom and heaviness around, as though long im- 
prisonment had made the very silence sad. The homely 
hangings of the beds and windows had begun to droop ; 
the dust lay thick upon their dwindling folds ; and 
damps had made their way through ceiling, wall, and 
floor. The boards creaked beneath their tread, as if 
resenting the unaccustomed intrusion ; nimble spiders, 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


167 


paralyzed by the taper’s glare, checked the motion of 
their hundred legs upon the wall, or dropped like life- 
less things upon the ground ; the death-watch ticked ; 
and the scampering feet of rats and mice rattled behind 
the wainscot. 

As they looked about them on the decaying furniture 
it was strange to find how vividly it presented those to 
whom it had belonged, and with whom it was once fa- 
miliar. Grip seemed to perch again upon his high- 
backed chair ; Barnaby to crouch in his old favorite cor- 
ner by the fire ; the mother to resume her usual seat, 
and watch him as of old. Even when they could sepa- 
rate these objects from the phantoms of the mind which 
they invoked, the latter only glided out of sight, but 
lingered near them still ; for then they seemed to lurk 
in closets and behind the doors, ready to start out and 
suddenly accost them in well-remembered tones. 

They went down-stairs, and again into the room they 
had just now left. Mr. Haredale unbuckled his sword 
and laid it on the table, with a pair of pocket pistols ; 
then told the locksmith he would light him to the door. 

“ But this is a dull place, sir,” said Gabriel lingering ; 
“ may no one share your watch ? ” 

He shook his head, and so plainly evinced his wish to 
be alone, that Gabriel could say no more. In another 
moment the locksmith was standing in the street, whence 
he could see that the light once more travelled up-stairs, 
and soon returning to the room below, shone brightly 
through the chinks in the shutters. 

If ever man were sorely puzzled and perplexed, the 
locksmith was, that night. Even when snugly seated by 
his own fireside, with Mrs. Varden opposite in a night- 
cap and night-jacket, and Dolly beside him (in a most 


168 


BAKNABY RUDGE. 


distracting dishabille) curling her hair, and smiling as if 
she had never cried in all her life and never could — 
even then, with Toby at his elbow and his pipe in his 
mouth and Miggs (but that perhaps was not much) fall- 
ing asleep in the background, he could not quite discard 
his wonder and uneasiness. So, in his dreams — still 
there was Mr. Haredale, haggard and careworn, listen- 
ing in the solitary house to every sound that stirred, with 
the taper 'shining through the chinks until the day should 
turn it pale and end his lonely watching. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


169 


CHAPTER XLIIL 

Next morning brought no satisfaction to the lock- 
smith’s thoughts, nor next day, nor the next, nor many 
others. Often after nightfall he entered the street, and 
turned his eyes towards the well-known house ; and as 
surely as he did so, there was the solitary light, still 
gleaming through the crevices of the window-shutter, 
while all within was motionless, noiseless, cheerless, as a 
grave. Unwilling to hazard Mr. Haredale’s favor by 
disobeying his strict injunction, he never ventured to 
knock at the door or to make his presence known in any 
way.. But whenever strong interest and curiosity at- 
tracted him to the spot — which was not seldom — the 
light was always there. 

If he could have known what passed within, the knowl- 
edge would have yielded him no clew to this mysterious 
vigil. At twilight, Mr. Haredale shut himself up, and 
at daybreak he came forth. He never missed a night, 
always came and went alone, and never varied his pro- 
ceedings in the least degree. 

The manner of his watch was this. At dusk, he en- 
ered the house in the same way as when the locksmith 
oore him company, kindled a light, went through the 
rooms, and narrowly examined them. That done, he 
returned to the chamber on the ground-floor, and laying 
his sword and pistols on the table, sat by it until morn- 


170 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


He usually had a book with him, and often tried to 
read, but never fixed his eyes or thoughts upon it for 
five minutes together. The slightest noise without doors, 
caught his ear ; a step upon the pavement seemed to 
make his heart leap. 

He was not without some refreshment during the long 
lonely hours ; generally carrying in his pocket a sand- 
wich of bread and meat, and a small flask of wine. The 
latter, diluted with large quantities of water, he drank in 
a heated, feverish way, as though his throat were dried ; 
but he scarcely ever broke his fast, by so much as a 
crumb of bread. 

If this voluntary sacrifice of sleep and comfort had its 
origin, as the locksmith on consideration was disposed to 
think, in any superstitious expectation of the fulfilment 
of a dream or vision connected with the event on which 
he had brooded for so many years, and if he waited for 
some ghostly visitor who w^alked abroad when men lay 
sleeping in their beds, he showed no trace of fear or 
wavering. His stern features expressed inflexible reso- 
lution; his brows were puckered, and his lips compressed, 
with deep and settled purpose ; and when he started at a 
noise and listened, it was not with the start of fear but 
hope, and catching up his sword as though the hour had 
come at last, he would clutch it in his tight-clinched 
hand, and listen, with sparkling eyes and eager looks, 
until it died away. 

These disappointments were numerous, for they en 
sued on almost every sound, but his constancy was not 
shaken. Still, every night he was at his post, the same 
stern, sleepless, sentinel; and still night passed, and 
morning dawned, and he must watch again. 

This went on for weeks ; he had taken a lodging at 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


171 


Vauxhall in which to pass the day and rest himself ; and 
from this place, when the tide served, he usually came 
to London Bridge from Westminster by water, in order 
that he might avoid the busy streets. 

One evening, shortly before twilight, he came his ac- 
customed road upon the river’s bank, intending to pass 
through Westminster Hall into Palace Yard, and there 
take boat to London Bridge as usual. There was a 
pretty large concourse of people assembled round the 
Houses of Parliament, looking at the members as they 
entered and departed, and giving vent to rather noisy 
demonstrations of approval or dislike, according to their 
known opinions. As he made his way among the throng, 
he heard once or twice the No-Popery cry, which was 
then becoming pretty familiar to the ears of most men ; 
but holding it in very slight regard, and observing that 
the idlers were of the lowest grade, he neither thought 
nor cared about it, but made his way along, with perfect 
indifference. 

There were many little knots and groups of persons in 
Westminster Hall: some few looking upward at its 
noble ceiling, and at the rays of evening light, tinted by 
the setting sun, which streamed in aslant through its 
small windows, and growing dimmer by degrees, were 
quenched in the gathering gloom below; some, noisy 
passengers, mechanics going home from work, and other- 
wise, who hurried quickly through, waking the echoes 
with their voices, and soon darkening the small door in 
the distance, as they passed into the street beyond ; some, 
in busy conference together on political or private mat- 
ters, pacing slowly up and down with eyes that sought 
the ground, and seeming, by their attitudes, to listen 
earnestly from head to foot. Here, a dozen squabbling 


172 


BAllNABY RUDGE. 


urchins made a very Babel in the air ; there, a solitary 
man, half clerk, half mendicant, paced up and down 
with hungry dejection in his look and gait : at his elbow 
passed an errand-lad, swinging his basket round and 
round, and with his shrill whistle riving the very timbers 
of the roof ; while a more observant school-boy, half-way 
through, pocketed his ball, and eyed the distant beadle 
as he came looming on. It was that time of evening 
when if you shut your eyes and open them again, the 
darkness of an hour appears to have gathered in a 
second. The smooth-worn pavement, dusty with foot- 
steps, still called upon the lofty walls to reiterate the 
shuffle and the tread of feet unceasingly, save when the 
closing of some heavy door resounded through the build- 
ing like a clap of thunder, and drowned all other noises 
in its rolling sound. 

Mr. Haredale, glancing only at such of these groups 
as he passed nearest to, and then in a manner betokening 
that his thoughts were elsewhere, had nearly traversed 
the Hall, when two persons before him caught his atten- 
tion. One of these, a gentleman in elegant attire, car- 
ried in his hand a cane, which he twirled in a jaunty 
manner as he loitered on ; the other, an obsequious, 
crouching, fawning figure, listened to what he said — at 
times throwing in a humble word himself — and, with 
his shoulders shrugged up to his ears, rubbed his hands 
submissively, or answered at intervals by an inclination 
of the head, half-way between a nod of acquiescence, and 
a bow of most profound respect. 

In the abstract there was nothing very remarkable in 
this pair, for servility waiting on a handsome suit of 
clothes and a cane — not to speak of gold and silver 
sticks, or wands of office — is common enough. But 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


173 


there was that about the well-dressed man, yes, and 
about the other likewise, which struck Mr. Haredale 
with no pleasant feeling. He hesitated, stopped, and 
would have stepped aside and turned out of his path, but 
at the moment, the other two faced about quickly, and 
stumbled upon him before he could avoid them. 

The gentleman with the cane lifted his hat and had 
begun to tender an apology, which Mr. Haredale had 
begun as hastily to acknowledge and walk away, when 
he stopped short and cried, “ Haredale ! Gad bless me, 
this is strange indeed ! ” 

“ It is,” he returned impatiently ; “ yes — a ” — 

“ My dear friend,” cried the other, detaining him, 
“ why such great speed ? One minute, Haredale, for 
the sake of old acquaintance.” 

“ I am in haste,” he said. “ Neither of us has sought 
this meeting. Let it be a brief one. Good-night ! ” 

“ Fie, fie ! ” replied Sir John (for it was he), “ how 
very churlish! We were speaking of you. Your name 
was on my lips — perhaps you heard me mention it ? 
No ? I am sorry for that. I am really sorry. — You 
know our friend here, Haredale ; this is really a most 
remarkable meeting 1 ” 

The friend, plainly very ill at ease, had made bold to 
press Sir John’s arm, and to give him other significant 
hints that he was desirous of avoiding this introduction. 
As it did not suit Sir John’s purpose, however, that it 
should be evaded, he appeared quite unconscious of 
these silent remonstrances, and inclined his hand tow- 
ards him, as he spoke, to call attention to him more 
particularly. 

The friend, therefore, had nothing for it, but to muster 
jp the pleasantest smile he could, and to make a con- 


174 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


dilatory bow as Mr. Haredale turned his eyes upon him. 
Seeing that he was recognized, he put out his hand in 
an awkward and embarrassed manner, which was not 
mended by its contemptuous rejection. 

“ Mr. Gashford ! ” said Haredale, coldly. “ It is as 1 
have heard then. You have left the darkness for the 
light, sir, and hate those whose opinions you formerly 
held, with all the bitterness of a renegade. You are an 
honor, sir, to any cause. I wish the one you espouse 
at present, much joy of the acquisition it has made.” 

The secretary rubbed his hands and bowed, as though 
he would disarm his adversary by humbling himself be- 
fore him. Sir John Chester again exclaimed, with an 
air of great gayety, “ Now, really, this is a most remark- 
able meeting ! ” and took a pinch of snuff with his usual 
self-possession. 

“ Mr. Haredale,” said Gashford, stealthily raising his 
eyes, and letting them drop again when they met the 
other’s steady gaze, “ is too conscientious, too honorable, 
too manly, I am sure, to attach unworthy motives to an 
honest change of opinions, even though it implies a doubt 
of those he holds himself. Mr. Haredale is too just, 
too generous, too clear-sighted in his moral vision, 
to” — 

‘‘Yes, sir?” he rejoined with a sarcastic smile, finding 
that the secretary stopped. “ You were saying ” — 

Gashford meekly shrugged his shoulders, and looking 
on the ground again, was silent. 

“No, but let us really,” interposed Sir John at this 
juncture, “ let us really, for a moment, contemplate the 
very remarkable character of this meeting. Haredale, 
ny dear friend, pardon me if I think you are not suf- 
ficiently impressed with its singularity. Here we stand, 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


:7o 

by no previous appointment or arrangement, three old 
schoolfellows, in Westminster Hall: three old boarders 
in a remarkably dull and shady seminai-y at St. Omer’s, 
where you, being Catholics, and of necessity educated 
out of England, were brought up : and where I, being a 
promising young Protestant at that time, was sent to 
learn the French tongue from a native of Paris ! ” 

‘‘ Add to the singularity. Sir John,” said Mr. Hare- 
dale, “ that some of you Protestants of promise are at 
this moment leagued in yonder building, to prevent our 
having the surpassing and unheard-of privilege of teach- 
ing our children to read and write — here — in this land, 
where thousands of us enter your service every year, 
and to preserve the freedom of which, we die in bloody 
battles abroad, in heaps ; and that others of you, to the 
number of some thousands as I learn, are led on to look 
on all men of my creed as wolves and beasts of prey, by 
this man Gashford. Add to it besides, the bare fact that 
this man lives in society, walks the streets in broad day — 
I was about to say, holds up his head, but that he does not 
— and it will be strange, and very strange, I grant you.” 

“ Oh ! you are hard upon our friend,” replied Sir 
John, with an engaging smile. “ You are really very 
hard upon our friend ! ” 

“ Let him go on. Sir John,” said Gashford, fumbling 
with his gloves. “ Let him go on, I can make allow- 
ances, Sir John. I am honored with your good opinion, 
and I can dispense with Mr. Haredale’s. Mr. Hare- 
dale is a sufferer from the penal laws, and I can’t ex- 
pect his favor.” 

“ You have so much of my favor, sir,” retorted Mr. 
Haredale, with a bitter glance at the third party in their 
conversation, “ that J am glad to see you in such good 


17G 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


company. You are the essence of your great Associa- 
tion, in yourselves.” 

“ Now, there you mistake,” said Sir John, in his most 
benignant way. “ There — which is a most remarkable 
circumstance for a man of your punctuality and exact- 
ness, Haredale — you fall into an error. I don’t belong 
to the body ; I have an immense respect for its members, 
but I don’t belong to it ; although I am, it is certainly 
true, the conscientious opponent of your being relieved. 
I feel it my duty to be so ; it is a most unfortunate ne- 
cessity ; and cost me a bitter struggle. — Will you try 
this box ? If you don’t object to a trifling infusion of a 
very chaste scent, you’ll find its flavor exquisite.” 

“ I ask your pardon. Sir John,” said Mr. Haredale, 
declining the proffer with a motion of his hand, “ for 
having ranked you among the humble instruments who 
are obvious and in all men’s sight. I should have done 
more justice to your genius. Men of your capacity plot 
in secrecy and safety, and leave exposed posts to the 
duller wits.” 

“ Don’t apologize, for the world,” replied Sir John 
sweetly ; “ old friends like you and me, may be allowed 
some freedoms, or the deuse is in it.” 

Gashford, who had been very restless all this time, 
but had not once looked up, now turned to Sir John, and 
ventured to mutter something to the effect that he must 
go, or my lord would perhaps be waiting. 

“ Don’t distress yourself, good sir,” said Mr. Haredale, 
‘‘ I’ll take my leave, and put you at your ease ” — which 
he was about to do without ceremony, when he was 
stayed by a buzz and murmur at the upper end of the 
ball, and, looking in that direction, saw Lord George 
Gordon coming on, with a crowd of people round him. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


177 


There was a lurking look of triumph, though very 
differently expressed, in the faces of his two companions, 
which made it a natural impulse on Mr. Haredale’s part 
not to give way before this leader, but to stand there 
w'hile he passed. He drew himself up and, clasping 
his hands behind him, looked on with a proud and scorn- 
ful aspect, while Lord George slowly advanced (for the 
press was great about him) towards the spot where they 
were standing. 

He had left the House of Commons but that moment, 
and had come straight down into the Hall, bringing with 
him, as his custom was, intelligence of what had been 
said that night in reference to the Papists, and what 
petitions had been presented in their favor, and who had 
supported them, and when the bill was to be brought in, 
and when it would be advisable to present their own 
Great Protestant petition. All this he told the persons 
about him in a loud voice, and with great abundance of 
ungainly gesture. Those who were nearest him made 
comments to each other, and vented threats and mur- 
murings ; those who were outside the crowd cried 
“ Silence,” and “ Stand back,” or closed in upon the 
rest, endeavoring to make a forcible exchange of places : 
and so they came driving on in a very disorderly and 
irregular way, as it is the manner of a crowd to do. 

When they were very near to where the Secretary, 
Sir John, and Mr. Haredale stood. Lord George turned 
round and, making a few remarks of a sufficiently vio- 
lent and incoherent kind, concluded with the usual sen- 
timent, and called for three cheers to back it. While 
these were in the act of being given with great energy, 
he extricated himself from the press, and stepped up to 
Gashford’s side. Both he and Sir John being well 

VOL. u 12 


178 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


known to tlie populace, they fell back a little, and lefl 
the four standing together. 

“ Mr. Haredale, Lord George,” said Sir John Chester, 
seeing that the nobleman regarded him with an inquisi- 
tive look. “ A Catholic gentleman unfortunately — 
most unhappily a Catholic — but an esteemed acquain- 
tance of mine, and once of Mr. Gashford’s. My dear 
Haredale, this is Lord George Gordon.” 

“ I should have known that, had I been ignorant of 
his lordship’s person,” said Mr. Haredale. “ I hope 
there is but one gentleman in England who, address- 
ing an ignorant and excited throng, would speak of a 
large body of his fellow-subjects in such injurious lan- 
guage as I heard this moment. For shame, my lord, for 
shame ! ” 

“ I cannot talk to you, sir,” replied Lord George in a 
loud voice, and waving his hand in a disturbed and agi- 
tated manner ; “ we have nothing in common.” 

‘‘ We have much in common — many things — all that 
the Almighty gave us,” said Mr. Haredale ; “ and com- 
mon charity, not to say common sense and common de- 
cency, should teach you to refrain from these proceed- 
ings. If every one of those men had arms in their 
hands at this moment, as they have them in their heads, 
I would not leave this place without telling you that you 
disgrace your station.” 

“ I don’t hear you, sir,” he replied in the same manner 
is before ; “ I can’t hear you. It is indijBferent to me 
what you say. Don’t retort, Gashford,” for the secretary 
had made a show of wishing to do so ; “I can hold no 
communion with the worshippers of idols.” 

As he said this, he glanced at Sir John, who lifted his 
hands and eyebrows, as if deploring the intemperate 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


179 


conduct of Mr. Haredale, and smiled in admiration of 
the crowd and of their leader. 

“ He retort ! ” cried Haredale. “ Look you here, my 
lord. Do you know this man?” 

Lord George replied by laying his hand upon the 
shoulder of his cringing secretary, and viewing him wit | 
a smile of confidence. 

“ This man,” said Mr. Haredale, eying him from top 
"iO toe, ‘‘who in his boyhood was a thief, and has been 
‘rom that time to this, a servile, false, and truckling 
knave : this man, who has crawled and crept through 
life, wounding the hands he licked, and biting those he 
fawned upon : this sycophant, who never knew what 
honor, truth, or courage meant ; who robbed his benefac- 
tor’s daughter of her virtue, and married her to break 
her heart, and did it with stripes and cruelty : this crea- 
ture who has whined at kitchen windows for the broken 
food, and begged for halfpence at our chapel doors : this 
apostle of the faith, whose tender conscience cannot 
bear the altars where his vicious life was publicly de- 
nounced. — Do you know this man ? ” 

“ Oh, really — you are very, very hard upon our 
friend ! ” exclaimed Sir John. 

“ Let Mr. Haredale go on,” said Gashford, upon whose 
unwholesome face the perspiration had broken out dur- 
ing this speech, in blotches of wet ; “ I don’t mind him. 
Sir John ; it’s quite as indifferent to me what he says, as 
't is to my lord. If he reviles my lord, as you have 
heard. Sir John, how can 1 hope to escape ? ” 

“ Is it not enough, my lord,” Mr. Haredale continued, 

“ that I, as good a gentleman as you, must hold my prop- 
erty, such as it is, by a trick at which the state connives 
bec#Jise of these hard laws ; and that we may not teach 


180 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


our youth in schools the common principles of right and 
wrong ; but must we be denounced and ridden by such 
men as this ! Here is a man to head your No-Popery 
cry! For shame. For shame!” 

The infatuated nobleman had glanced more than once 
at Sir John Chester, as if to inquire whether there was 
any truth in these statements concerning Gashford, and 
Sir John had as often plainly answered by a shrug or 
look, “ Oh dear me ! no.” He now said, in the same 
loud key, and in the same strange manner as before : 

“ I have nothing to say, sir, in reply, and no desire to 
hear anything more. I beg you won’t obtrude your con- 
versation, or these personal attacks, upon me. I shall 
not be deterred from doing my duty to my country and 
my countrymen, by any such attempts, whether they 
proceed from emissaries of the Pope or not, I assure 
you. Come, Gashford ! ” 

They had walked on a few paces while speaking, and 
were now at the Hall-door, through which they passed 
together. Mr. Haredale, without any leave-taking, 
turned away to the river stairs, which were close at 
hand, and hailed the only boatman who remained there. 

But the throng of people — the foremost of whom had 
heard every word that Lord George Gordon said, and 
among all of whom the rumor had been rapidly dis- 
persed that the stranger was a papist who was bearding 
him for his advocacy of the popular cause — came pour- 
ing out pell-mell, and, forcing the nobleman, his secre- 
tary, and Sir John Chester on before them, so that they 
appeared to be at their head, crowded to the top of the 
stairs where Mr. Haredale waited until the boat was 
ready, and there stood still, leaving him on a little clear 
space by himself. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


181 


They were not silent, however, though inactive. At 
first some indistinct mutterings arose among them, which 
were followed by a hiss or tw'o, and these swelled by de- 
grees into a perfect storm. Then one voice said, “ Down 
with the Papists ! and there was a pretty general cheer, 
but nothing more. After a lull of a few moments, one 
man cried out, “ Stone him ; ” another, “ Duck him ; ” an- 
other, in a stentorian voice, “ No Popery ! ” This favor- 
ite cry the rest reechoed, and the mob, which might have 
been two hundred strong, joined in a general shout. 

Mr. Haredale had stood calmly on the brink of the 
steps, until they made this demonstration, when he 
looked round contemptuously, and walked at a slow pace 
down the stairs. He was pretty near the boat, when 
Gashford, as if without intention, turned about, and di- 
rectly afterwards a gi’eat stone was thrown by some 
hand, in the crowd, which struck him on the head, and 
made him stagger like a drunken man. 

The blood sprung freely from the wound, and trickled 
dowm his coat. He turned directly back, and rushing 
up the steps with a boldness and passion which made 
them all fall back, demanded; 

“ Who did that ? Show me the man who hit me.” 

Not a soul moved ; except some in the rear who slunk 
off, and, escaping to the other side of the way, looked on 
like indifferent spectators. 

“ Who did that ? ” he repeated. “ Show me the man 
who did it. Dog, was it you ? It was your deed, if not 
your hand — I know you.” 

He threw himself on Gashford as’ he said the words, 
and fcurled him to the ground. There was a sudden 
motion in the crowd, and some laid hands upon him, but 
his sword was out, and they fell off again. 


182 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ Mj lord — Sir John,” — he cried, “ draw, one ot 
jrou — you are responsible for this outrage, and I look to 
you. Draw, if you are gentlemen.” With that, he 
struck Sir John upon the breast with the flat of his 
weapon, and with a burning face and flashing eyes, 
stood upon his guard ; alone, before them all. 

For an instant, for the briefest space of time the mind 
can readily conceive, there was a change in Sir John’s 
smooth face, such as no man ever saw there. The next 
moment, he stepped forward, and laid one hand on 
Mr. Haredale’s arm, while with the other he endeavored 
to appease the crowd. 

“ My dear friend, my good Haredale, you are blinded 
with passion — it’s very natural, extremely natural — 
but you don’t know friends from foes.” 

“ I know them all, sir, I can distinguish well ” — he 
retorted, almost mad with rage. “ Sir John, Lord 
George — do you hear me ? Are you cowards ? ” 

“ Never mind, sir,” said a man, forcing his way be- 
tween and pushing him towards the stairs with friendly 
violence, “never mind asking that. For God’s sake, 
get away. What can you do against this number ? 
And there are, as many more in the next street, who’ll 
be round directly,” — indeed they began to pour in as 
he said the words — “ you’d be giddy from that cut, in 
the first heat of a scuffle. Now do retire, sir, or take 
my word for it you’ll be worse used than you would be 
if every man in the crowd was a woman, and that 
Amman Bloody Mary. Come, sir, make haste — as 
quick as you can.” 

Mr. Haredale, who began to turn faint and sick, felt 
how sensible this advice was, and descended the steps 
with his unknown friend’s assistance. John Grueby (for 


IJARNABY RUDGE. 


183 


John it was) helped him into the boat, and giving her a 
shove off, which sent her thirty feet into the tide, bade 
the waterman pull away like a Briton ; and walked up 
again as composedly as if he had just landed. 

There was at first a slight disposition on the part of 
he mob to resent this interference ; but John looking 
^larticularly strong and cool, and wearing besides Lord 
George’s livery, they thought better of it, and contented 
themselves with sending a shower of small missiles after 
the boat, which plashed harmlessly in the water ; for she 
had by this time cleared the bridge, and was darting 
swiftly down the centre of the stream. 

From this amusement, they proceeded to giving Prot- 
estant knocks at the doors of private houses, breaking a 
few lamps, and assaulting some stray constables. But, it 
being whispered that a detachment of Life Guards had 
beeri sent for, they took to their heels with great expe- 
iition, and left the street quite clear. 


184 


BAKNABY BUDGE. 


CHAPTER XLIV. 

When the concourse separated, and, dividing into 
chance clusters, drew oflf in various directions, there still 
.remained upon the scene of the late disturbance, one 
man. This man was Gashford, who, bruised by his late 
fall, and hurt in a much greater degree by the indignity 
he had undergone, and the exposure of which he had 
been the victim, limped up and down, breathing curses 
and threats of vengeance. 

It was not the secretary’s nature to waste his wrath in 
words. While he vented the froth of his malevolence 
in these effusions, he kept a steady eye on two men, 
who, having disappeared with the rest when the alarm 
was spread, had since returned, and were now visible in 
the moonlight, at no great distance, as they walked to 
and fro, and talked together. 

He made no move towards them, but waited patiently 
on the dark side of the street, until they were tired of 
strolling backwards and forwards and walked away in 
company. Then he followed, but at some distance : 
keeping them in view, without appearing to have that 
object, or being seen by them. 

They went up Parliament-street, past Saint Martin’s 
church, and away by Saint Giles’ to Tottenham Court 
Road, at the back of which, upon the western side, was 
then a place called the Green Lanes. This was a retired 
spot, not of the choicest kind, leading into the fields. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


155 


Great heaps of ashes ; stagnant pools, overgrown with 
rank grass and duckweed ; broken turnstiles ; and the 
upright posts of palings long since carried off for fire- 
wood, which menaced all heedless walkers with their 
jagged and rusty nails ; were the leading features of 
the landsc-ape ; while here and there a donkey, or a 
ragged horse, tethered to a stake, and cropping off a 
wretched meal from the coarse stunted turf, were quite 
in keeping with the scene, and would have suggested* 
(if the houses had not done so, sufficiently, of them- 
selves) how very poor the people were who lived in 
the crazy ^huts adjacent, and how foolhardy it might 
prove for one who carried money, or wore decent 
clothes, to walk that way alone, unless by daylight. 

Poverty has its whims and shows of taste, as wealth 
has. Some of these cabins were turreted, some had 
false windows painted on their rotten walls ; one had 
a mimic clock, upon a crazy tower of four feet high, 
which screened the chimney ; each in its little patch of 
ground had a rude seat or arbor. The population dealt 
in bones, in rags, in broken glass, in old wheels, in birds, 
and dogs. These, in their several ways of stowage, 
filled the gardens ; and shedding a perfume, not of the 
most delicious nature, in the air, filled it besides with 
yelps, and screams, and howling. 

Into this retreat, the secretary followed the two men 
whom he had held in sight ; and here he saw them safely 
lodged, in one of the meanest houses, which was but a 
room, and that of small dimensions. He waited without, 
until the sound of their voices, joined in a discordant 
song, assured him they were making merry ; and then 
approaching the door, by means of a tottering plank 
which crossed the ditch in front,' knocked at it with 
Uis hand. 


186 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“Muster Gashford ! ” said the man who opened it, 
taking his pipe from his mouth, in evident surprise. 
“Why, who’d have thought of this here honor! Walk 
in, Muster Gashford — walk in, sir.” 

Gashford required no second invitation, and entered 
with a gracious air. There was a fire in the rusty grate 
(for though the spring was pretty far advanced, the 
nights were cold), and on a stool beside it Hugh sat 
smoking. Dennis placed a chair, his only one, for the 
secretary, in front of the hearth ; and took his seat again 
upon the stool he had left when he rose to give the visitor 
admission. 

“ What’s in the wind now. Muster Gashford ? ” he 
said, as he resumed his pipe, and looked at him askew. 
“ Any orders from head-quarters ? Are we going to 
begin? What is it. Muster Gashford?” 

“ Oh, nothing, nothing,” rejoined the secretary with 
a friendly nod to Hugh. “We have broken the ice,^ 
though. We had a little spurt to-day — eh, Dennis?” 

“ A very little one,” growled the hangman. “ Not 
half enough for me.” 

“ Nor me neither ! ” cried Hugh. “ Give us some- 
thing to do with life in it — with life in it, master. 
Ha, ha!” 

“Why, you wouldn’t,” said the secretary, with his 
worst expression of face, and in his mildest tones, “ have 
inything to do, with — with death in it ? ” 

“ I don’t know that,” replied Hugh. “ I’m open to 
orders. I don’t care; not I.” 

“ Nor I ! ” vociferated Dennis. 

“ Brave fellows 1 ” said the secretary, in as pastor-like 
a voice as if he were commending them for some un- 
common act of valor and generosity. “ By the by,” — 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


187 


aud here he stopped and warmed his hands : then sud- 
denly looked up — “ who threw that stone to-day ? ” 

Mr. Dennis coughed and shook his head, as who 
should say, “ A mystery indeed ! ” Hugh sat and 
smoked in silence. 

“ It was well done ? ” said the secretary, warming hi 
hands again. “ I should like to know that man.” 

“ Would you ? ” said Dennis, after looking at his face 
to assure himself that he was serious. “ Would you like 
to know that man, Muster Grashford ? ” 

“ I should indeed,” replied the secretary. 

“ Why then. Lord love you,” said the hangman, in his 
hoarsest chuckle, as he pointed with his pipe to Hugh, 
“ there he sets. That’s the man. My stars and halters, 
Muster Gashford,” he added in a whisper, as he drew 
his stool close to him and jogged him with his elbow, 
“ what a interesting blade he is ! He wants as much 
holding in as a thorough-bred bull-dog. If it hadn’t been 
for me to-day, he’d have had that ’ere Roman down, and 
made a riot of it, in another minute.” 

“ And why not ? ” cried Hugh in a surly voice, as he 
overheard this last remark. “ Where’s the good of put- 
ting things off? Strike while the iron’s hot ; that’s what 
I say.” 

“ Ah ! ” retorted Dennis, shaking his head, with a 
kind of pity for his friend’s ingenuous youth ; “ but 
suppose the iron a’n’t hot, brother ? You must get 
people’s blood up afore you strike, and have ’em in 
the humor/ There wasn’t quite enough to provoke ’em 
to-day, I tell you. If you’d had your way, you’d have 
spoilt the fun to come, and ruined us.” 

“ Dennis is quite right,” said Gashford, smoothly. 

‘ He is perfectly correct. Dennis has great knowledge 
of the world.” 


188 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ I ought to have, Muster Gashford, seeing what a 
many people I’ve helped out of it, eh ? ” grinned the 
hangman, whispering the words behind his hand. 

The secretary laughed at this, just as much as Dennis 
could desire, and when he had done, said, turning to 
Hugh: — 

“ Dennis’s policy was mine, as you may have ob- 
served. You saw, for instance, how I fell when I 
was set upon. I made no resistance. I did nothing 
to provoke an outbreak. Oh dear no!” 

“ No, by the Lord Harry 1 ” cried Dennis with a noisy 
laugh, “ you went down very quiet. Muster Gashford — 
and very flat besides. I thinks to myself at the time 
‘ it’s all up with Muster Gashford ! ’ I never see a man 
lay flatter nor more still — with the life in him — than 
you did to-day. He’s a rough ’un to play with, is that 
’ere Papist, and that’s the fact.” 

The secretary’s face, as Dennis roared with laughter, 
and turned his wrinkled eyes on Hugh who did the like, 
might have furnished a study for the Devil’s picture. 
He sat quite silent until they were serious again, and 
then said, looking round : — 

“We are very pleasant here ; so very pleasant, Dennis, 
that but for my lord’s particular desire that I should sup 
with him, and the time being very near at hand, I should 
be inclined to stay, until it would be hardly safe to go 
homeward. I come upon a little business — yes, I do — 
as you supposed. It’s very flattering to you ; being this. 
If we ever should be obliged — and we can^t tell, you 
know — this is a very uncertain world ” — 

“ I believe you. Muster Gashford,” interposed the 
hangman with a grave nod. “ The uncertainties as 
I’ve seen in reference to this here state of existence, 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


189 


the unexpected contingencies as have come about ! — 
Oh my eye!” Feeling the subject much too vast for 
expression, he puffed at his pipe again, and looked the 
rest. 

“ I say,” resumed the secretary, in a slow, impressive 
way; “we can’t tell what may come to pass; and if we 
should be obliged against our wills, to have recourse to 
violence, my lord (who has suffered terribly to-day, as 
far as words can go) consigns to you two — bearing in 
mind my recommendation of you both, as good stanch 
men, beyond all doubt and suspicion — the pleasant task 
of punishing this Haredale. You may do as you please 
with him or his, provided that you show no mercy, and 
no quarter, and leave no two beams of his house stand- 
ing where the builder placed them. You may sack it, 
burn it, do with it as you like, but it must come down ; 
it must be razed to the ground ; and he, and all belong- 
ing to him, left as shelterless as new-born infants whom 
their mothers have exposed. Do you understand me ? ” 
said Gashford, pausing and pressing his hands together 
gently. 

“ Understand you, master I ” cried Hugh. “ You speak 
plain now. Why, this is hearty ! ” 

“I knew you would like it,” said Gashford, shaking 
him by the hand ; “ I thought you would. Good-night! 
Don’t rise, Dennis : I would rather find my way alone. 
I may have to make other visits here, and it’s pleasan* 
to come and go without disturbing you. I can find my 
way perfectly well. Good-night I ” 

He was gone, and had shut the door behind him. 
They looked at each other, and nodded approvingly: 
Dennis stirred up the fire. 

“ This looks a little more like business ! ” he said. 


190 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ Ay, indeed ! ” cried Hugh ; “ this suits me ! ” 

“ Tve heerd it said of Muster Gashford,” said the 
hangman, “ that he’d a surprising memory and wonder- 
ful firmness — that he never forgot, and never forgave. 
— Let’s drink his health ! ” 

Hugh readily complied — pouring no liquor on the 
floor when he drank this toast — and they pledged the 
secretary as a man after their own hearts in a bum- 
per 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


191 


CHAPTER XLV. 

While the worst passions of the worst men were 
thus working in the dark, and the mantle of religion, 
assumed to cover the ugliest deformities, threatened to 
become the shroud of all that was good and peaceful 
in society, a circumstance occurred which once more al- 
tered the position of two persons from whom this history 
has long been separated, and to whom it must now 
return. 

In a small English country town, the inhabitants of 
which supported themselves by the labor of their hands 
in plaiting and preparing straw for those who made 
bonnets and other articles of dress and ornament from 
that material, — .concealed under an assumed name, and 
living in a quiet poverty which knew no change, no 
pleasures, and few cares but that of struggling on from 
day to day in the one great toil for bread, — dwelt 
Barnaby and his mother. Their poor cottage had 
known no stranger’s foot since they sought the shelter 
of its roof five years before ; nor had they in all that 
time held any commerce or communication with the old 
world from which they had fled. To labor in peace 
and devote her labor and her life to her poor son, was 
all the widow sought. If happiness can be said at any 
time to be the lot of one on whom- a secret sorrow 
preys, she was happy now. Tranquillity, resignation, and 
her strong love of him who needed it so much, formed 


192 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


the small ^ circle of her quiet joys ; and while that re- 
mained unbroken, she was contented. 

For Barnaby himself, the time which had flown by, 
had passed him like the wind. The daily suns of years 
had shed no brighter gleam of reason on his mind ; no 


dawn had broken on his long, dark 


night. He would 


sit sometimes — often for days together — on a low seat 
by the fire or by the cottage-door, busy at work (for he 
had learnt the art his mother plied), and listening, God 
help him, to the tales she would repeat as a lure to keep 
him in her sight. He had no recollection of these little 
narratives ; the tale of yesterday was new upon the mor- 
row ; but he liked them at the moment ; and when the 
humor held him, would remain patiently within doors, 
hear ing her stories like a little child, and working cheer- 
fully from sunrise until it was too dark to see. 

4it other times, — and then their scanty earnings were 
barely sufficient to furnish them with food, though of the 
coarsest sort, — he would wander abroad from dawn of 
day until the twilight deepened into night. Few in that 
place, even of the children, could be idle, and he had no 
companions of his own kind. Indeed there were not 
many who could have kept up with him in his rambles, 
had there been a legion. But there were a score of 
vagabond dogs belonging to the neighbors, who served 
his purpose quite as well. With two or three of these, 
or sometimes with a full half-dozen barking at his heels, 
he would sally forth on some long expedition that con- 
sumed tlie day ; and though on their return at nightfall, 
the dogs would come home limping, and sore-footed, and 
almost spent with their fatigue, Barnaby was up and off 
again at sunrise with some new attendants of the same 
class, with whom he would return in like manner. On 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


193 


all these travels, Grip, in his little basket at his master’s 
back, was a constant member of the party, and when 
they set off in fine weather and in high spirits, no dog 
barked louder than the raven. 

Their pleasures on these excursions were simple 
>nough. A crust of bread and scrap of meat, with 
water from the brook or spring, sufficed for their repast. 
Barnaby’s enjoyments were, to walk, and run, and leap, 
till he was tired ; then to lie down on the long grass, or 
by the growing corn, or in the shade of some tall tree, 
looking upward at the light clouds as they floated over 
the blue surface of the sky, and listening to the lark as 
she poured out her brilliant song. There were wild- 
flowers to pluck — the bright red poppy, the gentle hare- 
bell, the cowslip, and the rose. There were birds to 
watch ; fish ; ants ; worms ; hares or rabbits, as they 
darted across the distant pathway in the wood and so 
were gone : millions of living things to have an interest 
in, and lie in wait for, and clap hands and shout in mem- 
ory of, when they had disappeared. In default of these, 
or when they wearied, there was the merry sunlight to 
hunt out, as it crept in aslant through leaves and boughs 
of trees, and hid far down — deep, deep, in hollow places 
— like a silver pool, where nodding branches seemed to 
bathe and sport ; sweet scents of summer air breathing 
over fields of beans or clover ; the perfume of wet leaves 
or moss ; the life of waving trees, and shadows always 
changing. When these or any of them tired, or in ex- 
cess of pleasing tempted him to shut his eyes, there was 
slumber in the midst of all these soft delights, with the 
gentle wind murmuring like music in his ears, and every- 
thing around melting into one delicious dream. 

Their hut — for it was little more — stood on the out- 
13 


VOL. II. 


194 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Bkirts of the town, at a short distance from the high-road, 
but in a secluded place, where few chance passengers 
strayed at any season of the year. It had a plot of gar- 
den-ground attached, which Barnaby, in fits and starts 
of working, trimmed, and kept in order. Within doors 
and without, his mother labored for their common good ; 
and hail, r&in, snow, or sunshine, found no difference in 
her. 

Though so far removed from the scenes of her past 
life, and with so little thought or hope of ever visiting 
them again, she seemed to have a strange desire to know 
what happened in the busy world. Any old newspaper, 
or scrap of intelligence from London, she caught at with 
avidity. The excitement it produced was not of a pleas- 
urable kind, for her manner at such times expressed the 
keenest anxiety and dread ; but it never faded in the 
least degree. Then, and in stormy winter nights, when 
the wind blew loud and sti’ong, the old expression came 
into her face, and she would be seized with a fit of 
trembling, like one who had- an ague. But Barnaby 
noted little of this ; and putting a great constraint upon 
herself, she usually recovered her accustomed manner 
before the change had caught his observation. 

Grip was by no means an idle or unprofitable member 
of the humble household. Partly by dint of Barnaby’a 
tuition, and partly by pursuing a species of self-instruc- 
tion common to his tribe, and exerting his powers of 
observation to the utmost, he had acquired a degree of 
agacity which rendered him famous for miles round. 
His conversational powers and surprising performances 
were the universal theme : and as many persons came 
to see the wonderful raven, and none left his exertions 
unrewarded — when he condescended to exhibit, which 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


195 


was not always, for genius is capricious — his earnings 
formed an important item in the common stock. Indeed, 
the bird himself appeared to know his value well ; for 
though he was perfectly free and unrestrained in the 
presence of Barnaby and his mother, he maintained in 
public an amazing gravity, and never stooped to any 
other gratuitous performances than biting the ankles of 
vagabond boys (an exercise in which he much de- 
lighted), killing a fowl or two occasionally, and swal- 
lowing the dinners of various neighboring dogs, of 
whom the boldest held hiuj in great awe and dread. 

Time had glided on in this way, and nothing had hap- 
pened to disturb or change their mode of life, when, one 
summer’s night in June, they were in their little garden, 
resting from the labors of the day. The widow’s work 
was yet upon her knee, and strewn upon the ground 
about her; and Barnaby stood leaning on his spade, 
gazing at the brightness in the west, and singing softly 
to himself. 

“ A brave evening, mother ! If we had, chinking in 
our pockets, but a few specks of that gold which is piled 
up yonder in the sky, we should be rich for life.” 

“We are better as we are,” returned the widow with 
a quiet smile. “ Let us be contented, and we do not 
want and need not care to have it, though it lay shin 
ing at our feet.” 

“ Ay ! ” said Barnaby, resting with crossed arms on 
his spade, and looking wistfully at the sunset, “ that’ 
well enough, mother ; but gold’s a good thing to have. 
I wish that I knew where to find it. Grip and I could 
do much with gold, be sure of that.” 

“ What would you do ? ” she asked 

“ What ! A world of things. We d dress finely — 


196 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


you and I, I mean ; not Grip — keep horses, dogs, 
wear bright colors and feathers, do no more work, live 
delicately and at our ease. Oh, we’d find uses for it, 
mother, and uses that would do us good. I would I 
knew where gold was buried. How hard I’d work to 
dig it up ! ” 

“ You do not know,” said his mother, rising from her 
seat, and laying her hand upon his shoulder, “ what 
men have done to win it, and how they have found, 
too late, that it glitters brightest at a distance, and turns 
quite dim and dull when handled.” 

“ Ay, ay ; so you say ; so you think,” he answered, 
still looking eagerly in the same direction. “ For all 
that, mother, I should like to try.” 

‘‘ Do you not see,” she said, “ how red it is ? Nothing 
bears so many stains of blood, as gold. Avoid it. None 
have such cause to hate its name as we have. Do not 
so much as think of it, dear love. It has brought such 
misery and suffering on your head and mine as few 
have known, and God grant few may have to undergo. 
I would rather we were dead and laid down in our 
graves, than you should ever come to love it.” 

For a moment Barnaby withdrew his eyes and looked 
at her with wonder. Then, glancing from the redness 
in the sky to the mark upon his wrist as if he would 
compare the two, he seemed about to question her with 
earnestness, when a new object caught his wander 
ing attention, and made him quite forgetful of his 
purpose. 

This was a man with dusty feet and garments, who 
stood, bareheaded, behind the hedge that divided their 
patch of garden from the pathway, and leant meekly 
forward as if he sought to mingle with their conver- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


197 


Bation, and waited for his time to speak. His face 
was turned towards the brightness, too, but the light 
that fell upon it showed that he was blind, and saw 
it not. 

“ A blessing on those voices ! ” said the wayfarer. “ I 
feel the beauty of the night more keenly, when I hear 
them. They are like eyes to me. Will they speak 
again, and cheer the heart of a poor traveller ? ” 

“ Have you no guide ? ” asked the widow, after a 
moment’s pause. 

“None but that,” he answered, pointing with his 
staff towards the sun ; “ and sometimes a milder one at 
night, but she is idle now.” 

“ Have you travelled far ? ” 

“ A weary way and long,” rejoined the traveller as he 
shook his head. “ A weary, weary, way. I struck my 
stick just now upon the bucket of your well — be 
pleased to let me have a draught of wateri lady.” 

“ Why do you call me lady ? ” she returned. “ I am 
as poor as you.” 

“ Your speech is soft and gentle, and I judge by 
that,” replied the man. “ The coarsest stuffs and finest 
silks, are — apart from the sense of touch — alike to 
me. I cannot judge you by your dress.” 

Come round this way,” said Barnaby, who had 
passed out at the garden gate and now stood close be- 
side him. “ Put your hand in mine. You’re blind and 
always in the dark, eh ? Are you frightened in the 
iark ? Do you see great crowds of faces, now ? Do 
ihey grin and chatter ? ” 

“ Alas ! ” returned the other, “ I see nothing. Wak- 
ing or sleeping, nothing.” 

Barnaby looked curiously at his eyes, and touching 


198 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


them with his fingers, as an inquisitive child might, led 
him towards the house. 

“ You have come a long distance,” said the widow', 
meeting him at the door. “ How have you found your 
way so far?” 

“ Use and necessity are good teachers, as I have heard 
— the best of any,” said the blind man, sitting down 
upon the chair to which Barnaby had led him, and put- 
ting his hat and stick upon the red-tiled floor. “May 
neither you nor your son ever learn under them. They 
are rough masters.” 

“ You have wandered from the road, too,” said the 
widow, in a tone of pity. 

“ Maybe, maybe,” returned the blind man with a sigh, 
and yet with something of a smile upon his face, “ that’s 
likely. Hand-posts and milestones are dumb, indeed, to 
me. Thank you the more for this rest, and this refresh 
ing drink ! ” 

As he spoke, he raised the mug of water to his mouth. 
It \vas clear, and cold, and sparkling, but not to his taste 
nevertheless, or his thirst was not very great, for he only 
wretted his lips and put it dowm again. 

He wore, hanging with a long strap round his neck, 
a kind of scrip or w'allet, in which to carry food. The 
widow set some bread and cheese before him, but he 
thanked her, and said that through the kindness of the 
charitable he had broken his fast once since morning, 
and was not hungry. When he had made her this reply, 
he opened his wallet, and took out a few pence, which 
was all it appeared to contain. 

“ Might I make bold to ask,” he said, turning towards 
where Barnaby stood looking on, “ that one w'ho has the 
gift of sight, would lay this out for me in bread to keep 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


199 


me on my way ? Heaven’s blessing on the young feet 
that will bestir themselves in aid of one so helpless as a 
sightless man ! ” 

Barnaby looked at his mother, who nodded assent; 
in another moment he was gone upon his charitable 
errand. The blind man sat listening with an attentive 
face, until long after the sound of his retreating foot- 
steps was inaudible to the widow, and then said, sud- 
denly, and in a very altered tone : — 

“ There are various degrees and kinds of blindness, 
widow. There is the connubial blindness, ma’am, which 
perhaps you may have observed in the course of your 
own experience, and which is a kind of wilful and self- 
bandaging blindness. There is the blindness of party, 
ma’am, and public men, which is the blindness of a mad 
bull in the midst of a regiment of soldiers clothed in red. 
There is the blind confidence of youth, which is the 
blindness of young kittens, whose eyes have not yet 
opened on the world ; and there is that physical blind- 
ness, ma’am, of which I am, contrairy to my own desire, 
a most illustrious example. Added to these, ma’am, is 
that blindness of the intellect, of which we have a spe- 
cimen in your interesting son, and which, having some- 
times glimmerings and dawnings of the light, is scarcely 
to be trusted as a total darkness. Therefore, ma’am, 
I have taken the liberty to get him out of the way for 
a short time, while you and I confer together, and 
this precaution arising out of the delicacy of my sen 
timents towards yourself, you will excuse me, ma’am, 
I know.” 

Having delivered himself of this speech with many 
fiourishes of manner, he drew from beneath his coat a 
fiat stone bottle, and holding the cork between his teeth, 


200 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


qualified his mug of water with a plentiful infusion of 
the liquor it contained. He politely drained the bum- 
per to her health, and the ladies, and setting it down 
empty, smacked his lips with infinite relish. 

“ I am a citizen of the world, ma’am,” said the blind 
man, corking his bottle, “ and if I seem to conduct my- 
self with freedom, it is therefore. You wonder who I 
am, ma’am^ and what has brought me here. Such ex- 
perience of human nature as I have, leads me to that 
conclusion, without the aid of eyes by which to read 
the movements of your soul as depicted in your femi- 
nine features. I wdll satisfy your curiosity immediately, 
ma’am ; im-mediately.” With that he slapped his bot- 
tle on its broad back, and having put it under his gar- 
ment^ as before, crossed his legs' and folded his hands, 
and settled himself in his chair, previous to proceeding 
any further. 

The change in his manner was so unexpected, the 
craft and wickedness of his deportment w^ere so much 
aggravated by his condition — for w^e are accustomed to 
see in those who have lost a human sense, something 
in its place almost divine — and this alteration bred so 
many fears in her whom he addressed, that she could not 
pronounce one w'ord. After waiting, as it seemed, for 
some remark or answer, and waiting in vain, the visitor 
resumed : — 

“ Madam, my name is Stagg. A friend of mine who 
has desired the honor of meeting with you any time 
these five years past, has commissioned me to call upon 
you. I should be glad to whisper that gentleman’s name 
in your ear. — Zounds, ma’am, are you deaf ? Do you 
hear me say that I should be glad to whisper my friend’s 
jiame in your ear ? ” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


201 


“ You need not repeat it,” said the widow, with a 
stifled groan ; “ I see too well from whom you corner” 

“ But as a man of honor, ma’am,” said the blind man, 
striking himself on the breast, “ whose credentials must 
not be disputed, I take leave to say that I will mention 
hat gentleman’s name. Ay, ay,” he added, seeming to 
catch with his quick ear the very, motion of her hand, 
“ but not aloud. With your leave, ma’am, I desire the 
favor of a whisper.” 

She moved towards him, and stooped down. He mut- 
tered a word in her ear; and, wringing her hands, she 
paced up and down the room like one distracted. The 
blind man, with perfect composure, produced his bottle 
again, mixed another glassful ; put it up as before ; and, 
drinking from time to time, followed her with his face in 
silence. 

“ You are slow in conversation, widow,” he said after 
a time, pausing in his draught. “We shall have to talk 
before your son.” 

“ What would you have me do ? ” she answered. 
“ What do you want ? ” 

“ We are poor, widow, we are poor,” he retorted, 
stretching out his right hand, and rubbing his thumb 
upon its palm. 

“ Poor ! ” she cried. “ And what am I ? ” 

“ Comparisons are odious,” said the blind man. “ I 
don’t know, I don’t care. I say that we are poor. My 
friend’s circumstances are indifferent, and so are mine. 
We must have our rights, widow, or we must be bought 
ofi*. But you know that, as well as I, so where is the 
ise of talking ? ” 

She still walked wildly to and fro. At length, stop- 
ping abruptly before him, she said : — 


202 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ Is he near here ? ” 

“ He is. Close at hand.” 

“ Then I am lost ! ” 

“ Not lost, widow,” said the blind man, calmly ; “ only 
found. Shall I call him ? ” 

“ Not for the world,” she answered, with a shudder. 

“ Very good,” he replied, crossing his legs again, for 
he had made as though he would rise and walk to the 
door. “ As you please, widow. His presence is not 
necessary that I know of. But both he and I must live ; 
to live, we must eat and drink ; to eat and drink, we 
must have money : — I say no more.” 

“ Do you know how pinched and destitute I am ? ” 
she retorted. “ I do not think you do, or can. If you 
had eyes, and could look around you on this poor place, 
you would have pity on me. Oh ! let your heart be 
softened by your own affliction, friend, and have some 
sympathy with mine.” 

The blind man snapped his fingers as he answered : — 
— “ Beside the question, ma’am, beside the question. 
I have the softest heart in the world, but I can’t live 
upon it. Many a gentleman lives well upon a soft head, 
who would find a heart of the same quality a very great 
drawback. Listen to me. This is a matter of business, 
with which sympathies and sentiments have nothing to do. 
As a mutual friend, I wish to arrange it in a satisfactory 
manner, if possible; and thus the case stands. — If you are 
very poor now, it’s your own choice. You have friends 
who, in Case of need, are always ready to help you. My 
friend is in a more destitute and desolate situation than 
most men, and you and he being linked together in a 
common cause, he naturally looks to you to assist him. 
He has boarded and lodged with me a long time (for as 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


203 


I said just now, I am very soft-hearted), and I quite ap- 
prove of his entertaining this opinion. You have always 
had a roof over your head ; he has always been an out- 
cast. You have your son to comfort and assist you ; he 
has nobody at all. The advantages must not be all one 
side. You are in the same boat, and we must divide 
the ballast a little more equally.'*’ 

She was about to speak, but he checked her, and 
went on. 

“ The only way of doing this, is by making up a little 
purse now and then for my friend ; and that’s what I 
advise. He bears you no malice that I know of, ma’am : 
so little, that although you have treated him harshly more 
than once, and driven him, I may say, out of doors, he 
has that regard for you that I believe, even if you disap- 
pointed him now, he would consent to take charge of 
your son, and to make a man of him.” 

He laid a great stress on these latter words, and 
paused as if to find out what effect they had produced. 
She only answered by her tears. 

“ He is a likely lad,” said the blind man, thoughtfully, 
“ for many purposes, and not ill-disposed to try his foY- 
tune in a little change and bustle, if I may judge from 
what I heard of his talk with you to-night. — ^-Come. In 
a word, my friend has pressing necessity for twenty 
pounds. You, who can give up an annuity, can get that 
sum for him. It’s a pity you should be troubled. You 
seem very comfortable here, and it’s worth that much to 
remain so. Twenty pounds, widow, is a moderate de- 
mand. You know where to apply for it ; a post will 
oring it you. — Twenty pounds!” 

She was about to answer him again, but again he 
stopped her. 


204 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ Don’t say anything hastily ; you might be sorry for 
It. Think of it a little while. Twenty pounds — of 
other people’s money — how easy! Turn it over in 
your mind. I’m in no hurry. Night’s coming on, and 
if I don’t sleep here, I shall not go far. Twenty pounds ! 
Consider of it, ma’am, for twenty minutes; give each 
pound a minute ; that’s a fair allowance. I’ll enjoy the 
air the while, which is very mild and pleasant in these 
parts.” 

With these words, he groped his way to the door, car- 
rying his chair with him. Then seating himself, under a 
spreading honeysuckle, and stretching his legs across the 
threshold so that no person could pass in or out without 
his knowledge, he took from his pocket a pipe, flint, steel, 
and tinder-box, and began to smoke. It was a lovely 
evening, of that gentle kind, and at that time of year, 
when the twilight is most beautiful. Pausing now and 
then to let his smoke curl slowly oflT, and to sniff the 
grateful fragrance of the flowers, he sat there at his ease 
— as though the cottage were his proper dwelling, and 
he had held undisputed possession of it all bis life — wait- 
ing for the widow’s answer and for Barnaby’s return. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


205 


CHAPTER XLVL 

When Barnaby returned with the bread, the sight of 
the pious old pilgrim smoking his pipe and making him- 
self so thoroughly at home, appeared to surprise even 
him ; the more so, as that worthy person, instead of put- 
ting up the loaf in his wallet as a scarce and precious 
article, tossed it carelessly on the table, and producing 
his bottle, bade him sit down and drink. 

“ For I carry some comfort you see,” he said. “ Taste 
that. Is it good ? ” 

The water stood in Barnaby’s eyes as he coughed 
from the strength of the draught, and answered in the 
affirmative. 

“ Drink some more,” said the blind man ; “ don’t be 
afraid of it. You don’t taste anything like that, often, 
eh?” 

“ Often ! ” cried Barnaby. “ Never ! ” 

“ Too poor ? ” returned the blind man with a sigh. 

■»“Ay. That’s bad. Your mother, poor soul, would be 
happier if she was richer, Barnaby.” 

“ Why, so I tell her — the very thing I told her just 
before you came to-night, when all that gold was in the 
sky,” said Barnaby, drawing his chair nearer to him, and 
looking eagerly in his face. “ Tell me. Is' there any 
way of being rich, that I could find out ? ” 

“ Any way ! A hundred ways.” 

“ Ay, ay ? ” he returned. “ Do you say so ? What 


206 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


are they ? — Nay, mother, it’s for your sake I ask ; not 
mine ; — for yours indeed. What are they ? ” 

The blind man turned his face, on which there was a 
smile of triumph, to where the widow stood in great dis- 
tress ; and answered, — 

“ Why, they are not to be found out by stay-at-homes, 
iny good friend.” 

“ By stay-at-homes ! ” cried Barnaby, plucking at his 
sleeve. “ But I am not one. Now, there you mistake. 
I am often out before the sun, and travel home when he 
has gone to rest. I am away in the woods before the 
day has reached the shady places, and am often there 
when the bright moon is peeping through the boughs, 
and 'looking down upon the other moon that lives in 
water. As I walk along, I try to find, among the grass 
and moss, some of that sfnall money for which she works 
so hard and used to shed so many tears. As I lie asleep 
in the shade, I dream of it — dream of digging it up in 
heaps ; and spying it out, hidden under bushes ; and 
seeing it sparkle, as the dew-drops do, among the leaves. 
But I never find it. Tell me where it is. I’d go there, 
if the journey were a whole year long, because I know 
she would be happier when I came home and brought 
some with me. Speak again. I’ll listen to you if you 
talk all night.” 

The blind man passed his hand lightly over the poor 
fellow’s face, and finding that his elbows were planted 
on the table, that his chin rested on his two hands, that 
he leaned eagerly forward, and that his whole manner 
expressed the utmost interest arid anxiety, paused for a 
\ainute as though he desired the widow to observe this 
fully, and then made answer : — 

“It’s in the world, bold Barnaby, the merry world; 


BARNABY RUDGE. * 207 

not in solitary places like those you pass your time in, 
but in crowds, and where there’s noise and rattle.” 

“ Good ! good ! ” cried Barnaby, rubbing his hands. 
“ Yes ! I love that. Grip loves it too. It suits us both. 
That’s brave ! ” 

— “ The kind of places,” said the blind man, “ that a 
young fellow likes, and in which a good son may do 
more for his mother, and himself to boot, in a month, 
than he could here in all his life — that is, if he had a 
friend, you know, and some one to advise with.” 

“ You hear this, mother ? ” cried Barnaby, turning to 
her with delight. “ Never tejl me we shouldn’t heed it, 
if it lay shining at our feet. Why do we heed it so 
much now ? Why do you toil from morning until 
night.?” 

“ Surely,” said the blind man, “ surely. Have you 
no answer, widow ? Is your mind,” he slowly added, 
“ not made up yet ? ” 

“ Let me speak with you,” she answered, “ apart.” 

“ Lay your hand upon my sleeve,” said Stagg, rising 
from the table ; “ and lead me where you will. Cour- 
age, bold Barnaby. We’ll talk more of this: I’ve a 
fancy for you. Wait there till I come back. Now, 
widow.” 

She led him out at the door, and into the little garden, 
where they stopped. 

“ You are a fit agent,” she said, in a half breathless 
manner, “ and well represent the man who sent you 
here.” * 

“ I’ll tell him that you said so,” Stagg retorted. “ He 
has a regard for you, and will respect me the more (if 
possible) for your praise. We must have our rights, 
widow.” 


208 • 


BARN.VBY RUDGE. 


“ Eights ! Do you know,” she said, “ that a word from 
me ” — 

“ Why do you stop ? ” returned the blind man calmly, 
after a long pause. “ Do I know that a word from you 
would place my friend in the last position of the dance 
of life ? Yes, I do. What’ of that ? It will never be 
spoken, widow.” 

“ You are sure of that ? ” 

“ ftuite — so sure, that I don’t come here to discuss 
the question. I say we must have our rights, or we 
must be bought off. Keep to that point, or let me re- 
turn to my young friend, for I have an interest in the 
lad, and desire to put him in the way of making his for- 
tune. Bah! you needn’t speak,” he -added hastily; “I 
know what you would say : you have hinted at it once al- 
ready. Have I no feeling for you, because I am blind ? 
No, I have not. Why do you expect me, being in dark- 
ness, to be better than men who have their sight — why 
should you ? Is the hand of Heaven more manifest in 
my having no eyes, than in your having two ? It’s the 
cant of you folks to be horrified if a blind man robs, or 
lies, or steals; oh yes, it’s far worse in him, who can barely 
live on the few halfpence that are thrown to him in 
streets, than in you, who can see, and work, and are 
not dependent on the mercies of the world. A curse 
on you 1 You who have five senses may be wicked at 
your pleasure,; we who have four, and want the most 
important, are to live and be moral on our affliction. 
The true charity and justice of rich to poor, all the 
world over ! ” 

He paused a moment when he had said these words, 
and caught the sound of money, jingling in her hand. 

“Well?” he cried, quickly resuming his former man- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


209 


ner. That should lead to something. the point, 
widow ? ” 

“ First answer me one question,” she replied. ‘‘You 
say he is close at hand. Has he left London ? ” 

“ Being close at hand, widow, it would seem he has,” * 
returned the blind man. 

“ I mean for good ? You know that.” 

“ Yes, for good. The truth is, widow, that his making 
a lon'ger stay there might have had disagreeable conse- 
quences. He has come away for that reason.” 

“ Listen,” said the widow, telling some money out, 
upon a bench beside them. “ Count.” 

“Six,” said the blind man, listening attentively. “Any 
more ? ” 

“ They are the savings,” she answered “ of five years. 
Six guineas.” 

.He put out his hand for one of the coins ; felt it care- 
fully, put it between his teeth, rung it on the bench ; and 
nodded to her to proceed. 

“ These have been scraped together and laid by, lest 
sickness or death should separate my son and me. They 
have been purchased at the price of much hunger, hard 
labor, and want of rest. If you can take them — do — 
on condition that you leave this place upon the instant, 
and enter no more into that room, where he sits now, ex- 
pecting your return.” 

“ Six guineas,” said the blind man, shaking his head, 

“ though of the fullest weight that were ever coined, fall 
very far short of twenty pounds, widow.” 

“ For such a sum, as you know, I must write to a dis- 
tant part of the country. To do that, and receive an 
answer, I must have time.” 

“ Two days 1 ” said Stagg. 

VOL. II. . 14 


210 


UAKNABY RUDGE. 


« More.” 

“ Four days ? ” 

“ A week. Return on this day week, at the same 
hour, but not to the house. Wait at the corner of the 
. lane.” 

“ Of course,” said the blind man, with a crafty look, 
I shall find you there ? ” 

“ Where else can I take refuge ? Is it not enough 
that you have made a beggar of me, and that I have 
sacrificed my whole store, so hardly earned, to preserve 
this home ? ” 

“ Humph ! ” said the blind man, after some considera- 
tion. “ Set me with my face towards the point you speak 
of, and in the middle of the roatb Is this the spot ? ” 

“It is.” 

“ On this day week at sunset. And think of him with- 
in doors. — For the present, good-night.” 

She made him no answer, nor did he stop for any. 
He went slowly away, turning his head from time to 
time, and stopping to listen, as if he were curious to 
know whether he was watched by any one. The shadows 
of night were closing fast around, and he was soon lost 
in the gloom. It was not, however, until she had trav- 
ersed the lane from end to end, and made sure that he 
was gone, that she reentered the cottage, and hurriedly 
barred the door and window. 

“ Mother ! ” said Barnaby. “ What is the matter ? 
Where is the blind man ? ” 

“ He is gone.” 

“ Gone ! ” he cried, starting up. “ I must have more 
talk with him. Which way did he take ? ” 

“ I don’t know,” she answeiHid, folding her arms about 
him. “ You must not go out to-night. There are ghosts 
and dreams abroad.” 


CARNABY RUDGE. 


211 


Ay ? ” said Barnaby, in a frightened whisper. 

“ It is not safe to stir. We must leave this place to- 
morrow.” 

“ This place ! This cottage — and the little garden, 
mother ! ” 

“ Yes ! To-morrow morning at sunrise. We must 
travel to London ; lose ourselves in that wide place — 
there would be some trace of us in any other town — 
then travel on again, and find some new abode.” 

Little persuasion was required to reconcile Barnaby to 
anything that promised change. In another minute, he 
was wild with delight ; in another, full of grief at the 
prospect of parting with his friends tlie dogs ; in an- 
other, wild again ; then he was fearful of what she had 
said to prevent his wandering about that night, and full 
of terrors and strange questions. His light-heartedness 
in the end surmounted all hiS other feelings, and lying 
down in his clothes to the end that he might be ready on 
the morrow, he soon fell fast asleep before the poor turf- 
fire. 

His mother did not close her eyes, but sat beside him, 
watching. Every breath of wind sounded in her ears 
like that dreaded footstep at the door, or like that hand 
upon the latch, and made the calm summer night, a night 
of horror. At length the welcome day appeared. When 
she had made the little preparations which were needful 
for their journey, and had prayed upon her knees with 
many tears, she roused Barnaby, who jumped up gayly 
at her summons. 

His clothes were few enough, and to carry Grip was 
a labor of love. As the sun shed his earliest beams 
upon the earth, they closed the door of their deserted 
- home, and turned away. The sky was blue and bright. 


212 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


The air was fresh and filled with a thousand perfumes 
Barnaby looked upward, and laughed with all his heart. 

But it was a day he usually devoted to a long ramble, 
and one of the dogs — the ugliest of them all — came 
bounding up, and jumping round him in the fulness, of 
his joy. He had to bid him go back in a surly tone, 
and his heart smote him while he did so. The dog re- 
treated; turned with a half-incredulous, half-imploring 
look ; came a little back ; and stopped. 

It was the last appeal of an old companion and a 
faithful friend — cast off. Barnaby* could bear no more, 
and as he shook his head and waved his playmate home, 
he burst into tears. 

“ Oh mother, mother, how mournful he will be when 
he scratches at the door, and finds it always shut ! ” 

There was such a sense of home in the thought, that 
though her own eyes overflowed she would not have 
obliterated the recollection of it, either from her own 
mind or from his, for the wealth cf the whole wide 
world. 


BAR NAB Y RUDGE. 


213 


CHAPTER XLVIL 

In the exhaustless catalogue of Heaven’s mercies to 
mankind, the power we have of finding some germs of 
comfort in the hardest trials must ever occupy the fore- 
most place ; not only because it supports and upholds us 
when we most require to be sustained, but because in 
this source of consolation there is something, we have 
reason to believe, of the divine spirit ; something of that 
goodness which detects amidst- our own evil doings, a 
redeeming quality ; something which, even in our fallen 
nature, we - possess in common with the angels ; which 
had its being in the old time when they trod the earth, 
and lingers on it yet, in pity. 

How often, on their journey, did the widow remember 
with a grateful heart, that out of his deprivation Barna- 
by’s cheerfulness and affection sprung ! How often did- 
she call to mind that but for that, he might have been 
sullen, morose, unkind, far removed from her — vicious, 
perhaps, and cruel ! How often had she cause for com- 
fort, in his strength, and hope, and in his simple nature ! 
Those feeble powers of mind which rendered him so 
soon forgetful of the past, save in brief gleams and 
flashes, — even they were a comfort now. The world 
to him was full of happiness ; in every tree, and plant, 
and flower, in every bird, and beast, and tiny insect 
whom a breath of summer wind laid low upon the 
ground, he had delight. His delight was hers ; and 


214 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


where mariy a wise son would have made her sorrowful, 
this poor light-hearted idiot filled her breast with thank- 
fulness and love. 

Their stock of money was low, but from the hoard she 
had told into the blind man’s hand, the widow had with- 
held one guinea. This, with the few pence she possessed 
besides, was to two persons of their frugal habits, a 
goodly sum in bank. Moreover they had Grip in com- 
pany ; and when they must otherwise have cltanged the 
guinea, it was but to make him exhibit outside an ale- 
house door, or in a village street, or in the grounds or 
gardens of a mansion of the better sort, and scores, who 
would have given nothing in charity, were ready to bar- 
gain for more amusement from the talking bird. 

One day — for they moved slowly, and, although they 
had many rides in carts and wagons, were on the road 
a week — Barnaby with Grip upon his shoulder and his 
mother following, begged permission at a trim lodge to 
go up to the great house, at the other end of the avenue, 
and show his raven. The man within was inclined to 
give them admittance, and was indeed about to do so, 
when a stout gentleman with a long whip in his hand, 
and a flushed face which seemed to indicate that he had 
had his morning’s draught, rode up to the gate, and 
called in a loud voice and with more oaths than the oc- 
casion seemed to warrant to have it opened directly. 

“ Who hast thou got here ? ” said the gentleman 
angrily, as the man threw the gate wide open,- and 
pulled off* his hat, “ who are these ? Eh ? ar’t a beg- 
gar woman ? ” 

The widow answ^ered with a courtesy, that they were 
poor travellers. 

“ Vagrants,” said the gentleman, “ vagrants and vag- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


215 


abends. Thee wish to be made acquainted with the 
cage, dost thee — the cage, the stocks, and the whipping 
post ? Where dost come from ? ” 

She told him in a timid manner, — for he was very 
loud, hoarse, and red-faced, — and besought him not to 
be angry, for they meant no harm and would go upon 
their way that moment. 

“Don’t be too sure of that,” replied the gentleman, 
“ we don’t allow vagrants to roam about this place. I 
know what thou want’st — stray linen drying on hedges, 
and stray poultry, eh ? What hast got in that basket, 
lazy hound ? ” 

“ Grip, Grip, Grip — Grip the clever. Grip the wicked. 
Grip the knowing — Grip, Grip, Grip,” cried the raven, 
whom Barnaby had shut up on the approach of this stern 
personage. “ I’m a devil I’m a devil I’m a devil. Never 
say die Hurrah Bow wow wow, Polly put the kettle on 
we’ll all have tea.” 

“Take the virmin out, scoundrel,” said the gentleman, 
“ and let me see him.” 

Barnaby, thus condescendingly addressed, produced 
his bird, but not without much fear and trembling, and 
set him down upon the ground ; which he had no sooner 
done than Grip drew fifty corks at least, and then began 
to dance ; at the same time eying the gentleman with 
surprising insolence of manner, and screwing his head 
so much on one side that he appeared desirous of screw- 
ing it off upon the spot. 

The cork-drawing seemed to make a greater impres- 
sion on the gentleman’s mind, than the raven’s power 
of speech, and was indeed particularly adapted to his 
jbabits and capacity.' He desired to have that done 
again, but despite his being very peremptory, and not- 


210 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


ivithstanding that Barnaby coaxed to the utmost, Grip 
turned a deaf ear to the request, and preserved a dead 
silence. 

“ Bring him along,” said the gentleman, pointing to 
the house. But Grip, who had watched the action 
anticipated his master, by hopping on before them ; — 
constantly flapping his wings, and screaming “ cook ! 
meanwhile, as a hint perhaps that there was company 
coming, and a small collation would be acceptable. 

Barnaby and his mother walked on, on either side 
of the gentleman on horseback, who surveyed each of 
them from time to time in a proud and coarse man- 
ner, and occasionally thundered out some question, the 
tone of which alarmed Barnaby so much that he could 
find no answer, and, as a matter of course, could make 
him no reply. On one of these occasions, when the 
gentleman appeared disposed to exercise his horsewhip, 
the widow ventured to inform him in a low.voice and 
with tears in her eyes, that her son was of weak 
mind. 

“ An idiot, eh ? ” said the gentleman, looking at 
Barnaby as he spoke. “And how long hast been an 
idiot ? ” 

“ She knows,” was Barnaby’s timid answer, pointing 
to his mother — “I — always, I believe.” 

“ From his birth,” said the widow. 

“ I don’t believe it,” cried the gentleman, “ not a 
bit of •it. It’s an excuse not to work. There’s noth- 
ing like flogging to cure ‘that disorder. I’d make a 
diflference in him in ten minutes, I’ll be bound.” 

“ Heaven has made none in more than twice ten 
years., sir,” said the widow mildly. 

“ Then why don’t you shut him up ? we pay enough 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


217 


for county, institutions, damn ’em. But thou’d rathei' 
drag him about to excite charity — of course. Ay, I 
know thee.” 

Now this gentleman had various endearing appella- 
tions among his intimate friends. By some he was 
called “ a country gentleman of the true school,” by 
some “ a fine old country gentleman,” by some “ a sport- 
ing gentleman,” by some “ a thorough-bred Englishman,” 
by some “ a genuine John Bull ; ” but they all agreed in 
one respect, and that was, that it was a pity there were 
not more like him, and that because there were not, the 
country was going to rack and ruin every day. He was 
in the commission of the peace, and could write his name 
almost legibly ; but his greatest qualifications were, that 
he was more severe with poachers, was a better shot, a 
harder rider, had better ^horses, kept better dogs, could 
eat more solid food, drink more strong wine, go to bed 
every night more drunk and get up every morning more 
sober than any man in the county. In knowledge of 
horse-flesh he was almost equal to a farrier, in stable- 
learning he surpassed his own head groom, and in glut- 
tony not a pig on his estate was a match for him. He 
had no seat in Parliament himself, but he was extremely 
patriotic, and usually drove his voters up to the poll with 
his own hands. He was warmly attached to church and 
state, and never appointed to the living in his gift any 
but a three-bottle man and a first-rate fox-hunter. He 
mistrusted the honesty of all poor people who could read 
and write, and had a secret jealousy of his own wife (a 
young lady whom he had married for what his friends 
galled “ the good old English reason,” that her father’s 
property adjoined his own) for possessing those accom- 
plishments in a greater degree than himself. In short, 


218 ■ 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Barnaby being an idiot, and Grip a creature of mere 
brute instinct, it would be very hard to say what this 
gentleman was. 

He rode up to the door of a handsome house ap- 
proached by a great flight of steps, where a man was 
waiting to take his horse, and led the way into a large 
hall, which, spacious as it was, was tainted with the 
fumes of last night’s stale debauch. Great-coats, riding- 
whips, bridles, top-boots, spurs, and such gear, were 
strewn about on all sides, and formed, with some huge 
stags’ antlers, and a few portraits of dogs and horses, its 
principal embellishments. 

Throwing himself into a great cha'ir (in which by the 
by, he often snored away the night, when he had been, 
according to his admirers, a finer country gentleman 
than usual) he bade the man tell his mistress to come 
down : and presently there appeared, a little flurried, 
as it seemed, by the unwonted summons, a lady much 
younger than himself, who had the appearance of being 
in delicate health, and not too happy. 

“ Here ! Thou’st no delight in following the hounds 
as an Englishwoman should have,” said the gentleman. 
“ See to this here. That’ll please thee perhaps.” 

The lady smiled, sat down at a little distance from 
him, and glanced at Barnaby with a look of pity. 

“ He’s an idiot, the woman says,” observed the gentle- 
man, shaking his head ; “ I don’t believe it.” 

“ Are you his mother ? ” asked the lady. ■ 

She answered yes. 

“What’s the use of asking Aer?” said the gentleman, 
thrusting his hdnds into his breeches pockets. “ She’ll 
tell thee so, of course. Most likely he’s hired, at so much 
a day. There. Get on. Make him do something.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


219 


Grip having by this time recovered his urbanity, con- 
descended, at Barnaby’s solicitation, to repeat his various 
phrases of speech, and to go through the whole of his 
performances with the utmost success. The corks, and 
the never say die, atforded the gentleman so much de- 
light that be demanded the repetition of this part of the 
entertainment, until Grip got into his basket, and* posi- 
tively refused to say another word, good or bad. The 
lady too, was much amused with him ; and the closing 
point of his obstinacy £0 delighted her husband that 
he burst into a roar of laughter, and demanded his 
price. 

Barnaby looked as though he didn’t understand his 
meaning. Probably he did not. 

“ His price,” said the gentleman, rattling the money 
in his pockets, “what dost want for him? How 
much ? ” 

“ He’s not to be sold,” replied Barnaby, shutting up 
the basket in a great hurry, and throwing the strap over 
his shoulder. “ Mother, come away.” 

“ Thou seest how' much of an idiot he is, book-learner/’ 
said the gentleman, looking scornfully at his wife. “ He 
can make a bargain. What dost want for him, old 
woman ? ” 

“ He is my son’s constant companion,” said the widow. 
“ He is not to be sold, sir, indeed.” 

“ Not to be sold ! ” cried the gentleman, growing ten 
times redder, hoarser, and louder than before. “ Not to 
oe sold ! ” 

“Indeed no,” she answered. “We have never thought 
of parting with him, sir, I do assure you.” 

He was evidently about to make a very passionate 
retort, when a few murmured word? from his wife hap- 


220 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


pening to catch his ear, he turned sharply round, and 
said, “Eh? What?” 

“We can hardly expect them to sell the bird, against 
tlieir own desire,” she faltered. “ If they prefer to keep 
him ” 

“ Prefer to keep him ! ” he echoed. “These people, 
who go tramping about the country, a-pilfering and vaga- 
bondizing on all hands, ’prefer to keep a bird, when a 
landed proprietor and a justice asks his price ! That old 
woman’s been to school. I know she has. Don’t tell 
me no,” he roared to the widow, “I say, yes.” 

• Barnaby’s mother pleaded guilty to the accusation, 
and hoped there was no harm in it. 

“ No harm ! ” said the gentleman. “ No. No harm. 
No harm, ye old rebel, not a bit of harm. If my clerk 
was here, I’d set ye in the stocks, I would, or lay ye in 
jail for prowling up and down, on the look-out for petty 
larcenies, ye limb of a gypsy. Here, Simon, put these 
pilferers out, shove ’em into the road, out with ’em ! Ye 
don’t want to sell the bird, ye that come here to beg, 
don’t ye ? If they a’n’t out in double-quick, set the dogs 
upon ’em ! ” 

They waited for no further dismissal, but fled precip- 
itately, leaving the gentleman to storm away by him- 
self (for the poor lady had already retreated), and mak- 
ing a great many vain attempts to silence Grip, who, 
excited by the noise drew corks enough for a city feast 
as they hurried down the avenue, and appeared to con- 
gratulate himself beyond measure on having been the 
cause of the disturbance. When they had nearly reached 
the lodge, another servant, emerging from the shrubbery, 
feigned to be very active in ordering them off, but this 
man put a crown into the widow’s hand, and whisper- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


22 ] 


ing that his lady sent it, thrust them gently from the 
gate. 

This incident only suggested to the widow’s mind, 
when they halted at an ale-house some miles farther on, 
and heard the justice’s character as given by his friends, 
that perhaps something more than capacity of stomach 
and tastes for the kennel and the stable, were required 
to form either a perfect country gentleman, a thorough- 
bred Englishman, or a genuine John Bull ; and that 
possibly the terms were sometimes misappropriated, not 
to say disgraced. She little thought then, that a circum- 
stance so slight would ever influence their future for- 
tunes ; but time and experience enlightened her in this 
respect. 

“ Mother,” said Barnaby, as they were sitting next 
day in a w^agon which was to take them to within ten 
miles of the capital, “ we’re going to London first, you 
said. Shall we see that blind man there ? ’’ 

She was about to answer “ Heaven forbid ! ” but 
checked herself, and told him No, she thought not ; why 
did he ask ? 

“ He’s a wise man,” said Barnaby, with a thoughtful 
countenance. “ I wish that we may meet with him again. 
What was it that he said of crowds ? That gold was to 
be found where people crowded, and not among the 
trees and in such quiet places ? He spoke as if he loved 
it ; London is a crowded place ; I think we shall meet 
him there.” 

“But why do you desire to see him, love?” she 
asked. 

“ Because,” said Barnaby, looking wistfully at her, 
he talked to me about gold, which is a rare thing, and 
say what you will, a thing you would like to have, I 


222 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


know. And because he came and went away so 
strangely — just as white-heaaed old men come some^ 
times to my bed’s foot in the night, and say what I 
can’t remember when the bright day returns. He told 
me he’d come back. I wonder why he broke his 
word ! ” 

“ But you never thought of being rich or gay, before, 
dear Barnaby. You have always been contented.” 

He laughed and bade her say that again, then cried, 

“ Ay, ay — oh yes,” and laughed once more. ^ Then 
something passed that caught his fancy, and the topic 
wandered from his mind, and was succeeded by another 
just as fleeting. 

But it was plain from what 'he had said, and from his 
returning to the point more than once that day, and on 
the next, that the blind man’s visit, and indeed his words, 
had taken strong possession of his mind. Whether the 
idea of wealth .had occurred to him for the first time on 
looking at the golden clouds that evening — and images 
were often presented to his thoughts by outward objects 
quite as remote and distant ; or whether their poor and 
humble way of life had suggested it, by contrast, long 
ago ; or whether the accident (as he would deem it) of 
the blind man’s pursuing the current of his own remarks, 
had done so at the moment ; or he had been impressed 
by the mere circumstance of the man being blind, and, 
therefore, unlike any one with whom he had talked be>-* 
fore ; it was impossible to tell. She tried every means 
to discover, but in vain ; and the probability is that Bar- 
naby himself was equally in the dark. 

It filled her with uneasiness to find him harping on 
‘his string, but all that she could do, was to lead him 
[juickly to some other subject, and to dismiss it from his 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


223 


brain. To caution him against their visitor, to show any 
fear or suspicion in reference to him, would only be, she 
feared, to increase that interest with which Barnaby re- 
garded him, and to strengthen his desire to meet him 
once again. She hoped, by plunging into the crowd, to 
rid herself of her terrible pursuer, and then, by journey- 
ing to a distance and observing increased caution, if that 
were possible, to live again unknown, in secrecy and 
peace. 

They reached, in course of time, their halting-place 
within ten miles of London, and lay there for the night, 
after bargaining to be carried on foi* a trifle next day, in 
a light van which was returning empty, and was to start 
at five o’clock in the morning. The driver was punctual, 
the road good — save for the dust, the weather being 
very hot and dry — and at seven in the forenoon of 
Friday the second of June, one thousand seven hun- 
dred and eighty, they alighted at the foot of Westmin- 
ster Bridge, bade their conductor farewell, and stood 
alone, together, on the scorching pavement. For the 
freshness which night sheds upon such busy thorough- 
fares had already departed, and the sun was shining with 
uncommon lustre. 


224 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


CHAPTER XLVIIL 

Uncertain where to go next, and bewildered by the 
crowd of people who were already astir, they sat down 
in one of the recesses on the bridge, to rest. They soon 
became aware that the stream of life was all pouring 
one way, and that a vast throng of persons were crossing 
the river from the Middlesex to the Surrey shore, in un- 
usual haste and evident excitement. They were for the 
most part, in knots of two or three, or sometimes half a 
dozen ; they spoke little together — many of them were 
quite silent ; and hurried on as if they had one ab- 
sorbing object in view, which was common to them 
all. 

They were surprised to see that nearly every man in 
this great concourse, which still came pouring past, with- 
out slackening in the least, wore in his hat a blue cock- 
ade ; and that the chance passengers who were not so 
decorated, appeared timidly anxious to escape observa- 
tion or attack, and gave them the wall as if they would 
conciliate them. This, however, was natural enough, 
considering their inferiority in point of numbers ; for 
the proportion of those who wore blue cockades, to 
those who were dressed as usual, was at least forty or 
fifty to one. There was no quarrelling, however : the 
blue cockades went swarming on, passing each other 
when they could, and making all the speed that was 
possible in such a multitude ; and exchanged nothing 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


22b 


more than looks, and very often not even those, witl 
such of the passers-by as were not of their num« 
ber. 

At first, the current of people had been confined to 
the two pathways, and but a few more eager stragglers 
kept the road. But after half an hour or so, the passage 
was completely blocked up by the great press, which, be- 
ing now closely wedged together, and impeded by the 
carts and coaches it encountered, moved but slowly, 
and was sometimes at a stand for five or ten minutes 
together. 

After the lapse of nearly two hours, the numbers be- 
gan to diminish visibly, and gradually dwindling away, 
by little and little, left the bridge quite clear, save that, 
now and then, some hot and dusty man with the cockade 
in his hat, and his coat thrown over his shoulder, went 
panting by, fearful of being too late, or stopped to ask 
which way his friends had taken, and being directed, 
hastened on again like one refreshed. In this compara- 
tive solitude, which seemed quite strange and novel after 
the late crowd, the widow had for the first time an op- 
portunity of inquiring of an old man who came and sat 
beside them, what was the meaning of that great as- 
semblage. 

“ Why, where have you come from,” he returned, 
“ that you haven’t heard of Lord George Gordon’s 
Threat association ? This is the day that he presents 
he petition against the Catholics, God bless- him ! ” 

“ What have all these men to do with that ? ” she 
asked. 

“ What have they to do with it ! ” the old man replied. 
“ Why, how you talk ! Don’t you know his lordship has 
Jeclared he won’t present it to the house at all, unless it 
VOL. n. 15 


226 


BAKNABY RUDGE. 


is attended to the door by forty thousand good and true 
men at least ? There’s a crowd for you ! ” 

“ A crowd indeed ! ” said Barnaby. “ Do you hear 
that, mother ! ” 

“And they’re mustering yonder, as I am told,” re- 
sumed the old man, “nigh upon a hundred thousand 
strong. Ah ! Let Lord George alone. He knows his 
power. There’ll be a good many faces inside them three 
windows over there,” and he pointed to where the House 
of Commons overlooked the river, “ that’ll turn pale 
when good Lord George gets up this afternoon, and 
with reason too ! Ay, ay. Let his lordship alone. Let 
him alone. He knows ! ” And so, with much mum- 
bling and chuckling and shaking of his forefinger, he 
rose, with the assistance of his stick, and tottered off. 

“ Mother ! ” said Barnaby, “ that’s a brave crowd he 
talks of. Come ! ” 

“ Not to join it ! ” cried his mother. 

“ Yes, yes,” he answered, plucking at her sleeve. 
“ Why not ? Come ! ” 

“ You don’t know,” she urged, “ what mischief they 
may do, where they may lead you, what their meaning 
is. Dear Barnaby, for my sake ” — 

“ For your sake ! ” he cried, patting her hand. “ Well ! 
It is for your sake, mother. You remember what the 
blind man said, about the gold. Here’s a brave crowd 
Come ! Or wait till I come back — yes, yes, wait 
here.” 

She tried with all the earnestness her fears engen- 
dered, to turn him from his purpose, but in vain. He 
was stooping down to buckle on his shoe, wdien a hack- 
ney-coach passed them rather quickly, and a voice inside 
called to the driver to stop. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


227 


“ Young man,” said a voice within. 

Who’s that ? ” cried Barnaby, looking up. 

“ Do you wear this ornament ? ” returned the stranger, 
holding out a blue cockade. 

“ In Heaven’s name, no. Pray do not give it him ! ” 
exclaimed the widow. 

“ Speak for yourself, woman,” said the man within the 
coach, coldly. “ Leave the young man to his choice ; 
he’s old enough to make it, and to snap your apron- 
strings. He knows, without your telling, whether he 
‘wears the sign of a loyal Englishman or not.” 

Barnaby, trembling with impatience, cried “ Yes ! yes, 
yes, I do,” as he had cried a dozen times already. The 
man threw him a cockade, and crying “ Make haste to 
Saint George’s Fields,” ordered the coachman to drive 
on fast ; and left them. 

With hands that trembled with his eagerness to fix the 
bauble in his hat, Barnaby was adjusting it as he best 
could, and hurriedly replying to the tears and entreaties 
of his mother, when two gentlemen passed on the oppo- 
site side of the way. Observing them, and seeing how 
Barnaby was occupied, they stopped, whispered to- 
gether for an instant, turned back, and came over to 
them. 

“ Why are you sitting here ? ” said one of them, who 
was dressed in a plain suit of black, wore long lank hair 
and carried a great cane. “ Why have you not gone with 
the rest ? ” 

“ I am going sir,” replied Barnaby, finishing his task, 
and putting his hat on with an air of pride. “ I shall be 
there directly.” 

“ Say ‘ my lord,’ young man, when his lordship does 
you the honor of speaking to you,” said the second gen- 


228 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


tleman mildly. “If you don’t know Lord George Gor>' 
don when you see him, it’s high time you should.” 

“ Nay, Gashford,” said Lord George, as Barnaby 
pulled off his hat again and made him a low bow, “ it’s 
no great matter on a day like this, which every English- 
man will remember with delight and pride. Put on 
your hat, friend, and follow us, for you lag behind and' 
are late. It’s past ten now. Didn’t you know that the 
hour of assembling was ten o’clock ? ” 

Barnaby shook his head and looked vacantly from one 
to the other. 

“ You might have known it, friend,” said Gashford, 

“ it was perfectly understood. How came you to be so 
ill-informed ? ” 

“ He cannot tell you, sir,” the widow interposed. “ It’s 
of no use to ask him. We are but this morning come 
from a long distance in the country, and know nothing 
of these matters.” 

“ The cause has taken a deep root, and has spread its 
branches far and wide,” said Lord George to his secre- 
tary. “ This is a pleasant hearing. I thank Heaven 
for it.” 

“ Amen ! ” cried Gashford with a solemn face. 

“ You do not understand me, my lord,” said the widow. 
“ Pardon me, but you cruelly mistake my meaning. 
We know nothing of these matters. We have no desire 
or right to join in what you are about to do. This is 
my son, my poor afflicted son, dearer to me than my 
own life. In mercy’s name, my lord, go your way alone, 
and do not tempt him into danger ! ” 

“ My good woman,” said Gashford, “ how can you ! — 
Dear me. — What do you mean by tempting, and by 
danger? Do you think his lordship is a roaring lion, 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


229 


going about and seeking whom he may devour? God 
bless me ! ” 

“ No, no, my lord, forgive me,” implored the widow, 
laying both her hands upon his breast, and scarcely 
knowing what she did, or said, in the earnestness of her 
supplication, “ but there are reasons why you should 
hear my earnest mother’s prayer, and leave my son with 
me. Oh do. He is not in his right senses, he is not, 
indeed ! ” 

“ It is a bad sign of the wickedness of these times,” 
said Lord George, evading her touch, and coloring deep- 
ly, “ that those who cling to the truth and support the 
right cause, are set down as mad. Have you the heart 
to say this of your own son, unnatural mother ! ” 

“ I am astonished at you ! ” said Gashford, with a 
kind of meek severity. “ This is a very sad picture of 
female depravity.” 

“ He has surely no appearance,” said Lord George, 
glancing at Barnaby, and whispering in his secretary’s 
ear, “ of being deranged ? And even if he had, we 
must not construe any trifling peculiarity into madness. 
Which of us ” — and here he turned red again — 
“ would be safe, if that were made the law ! ” 

“ Not one,” replied the secretary ; “ in that case, the 
greater the zeal, the truth, and talent; the more direct 
the call from above ; the clearer would be the madness. 
With regard to this young man, my lord,” he added, with 
a lip that slightly curled as he looked at Barnaby, who 
stood twirling his hat, and stealthily beckoning them to 
come away, “ he is as sensible and self-possessed as any 
one I ever saw.” 

“ And you desire to make one of this great body ? ” 
said Lord George, addressing him ; “ and intended to 
make one did 5^ou ? ” 


230 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ Yes — yes,” said Barnaby, with sparkling eyes. 
“ To be sure I did ! I told her so myself.” 

“ I see,” replied Lord George, with a reproachful 
glance at the unhappy mother. “ I thought so Follow 
me and this gentleman, and you shall have your wish.” 

Barnaby kissed his mother tenderly on the cheek, and 
bidding her be of good cheer, for their fortunes were 
both made now, did as he was desired. She, poor 
woman, followed too — with how much fear and grief 
it would be hard to tell. 

They passed quickly through the Bridge-road, where 
the shops were all shut up (for the passage of the great 
crowd and the expectation of their return had alarmed 
the tradesmen for their goods and windows), and where, 
in the upper stories, all the inhabitants were congre- 
gated, looking down into the street below, with faces 
variously expressive of alarm, of interest, expectancy, 
and indignation. Some of these applauded, and some 
hissed ; but regardless of these interruptions — for the 
noise of a vast congregation of people at a little distance, 
sounded in his ears like the roaring of a sea — Lord 
George Gordon quickened his pace, and presently ar- 
rived before Saint George’s Fields. 

They were really fields at that time, and of consider- 
able extent. Here an immense multitude was collected, 
bearing flags of various kinds and sizes, but all of the 
same color — blue, like the cockades — some sections 
marching to and fro in military array, and others drawn 
up in circles, squares, and lines. A large portion, both 
of the bodies which paraded the ground, and of those 
which remained stationary, were occupied in singing 
hymns or psalms. With whomsoever this originated, it 
was well done ; for the sound of so many thousand 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


231 


voices in the air must have stirred the heart of any man 
within him, and could not fail to have a wonderful effect 
upon enthusiasts, however mistaken. 

Scouts had been posted in advance of the great body, 
to give notice of their leader’s coming. These falling 
back, the word was quickly passed through the whole 
host, and for a short interval there ensued a profound 
and death-like silence, during which the mass was so still 
and quiet, that the fluttering of a banner caught the eye, 
and became a circumstance of note. Then they burst 
into a tremendous shout, into another, and another ; and 
the air seemed rent and shaken, as if by the discharge 
of cannon. 

“ Gashford ! ” cried Lord George, pressing his secre- 
tary’s arm tight within his own, and speaking with as 
much emotion in his voice, as in his altered face, “ I am 
called indeed, now. I feel and know it. I am the 
leader of a host. If they summoned me at this moment 
with one voice to lead them on to death. I’d do it — Yes, 
and fall first myself! ” 

“ It is a proud sight,” said the secretary. “ It is a 
noble day for England, and for the great cause through- 
out the world. Such homage, my lord, as I, an humble 
but devoted man, can render ” — 

What are you doing ! ” cried his master, catching 
him by both hands ; for he had made a show of kneel- 
ing at his feet. “ Do not unfit me, dear Gashford, for the 
solemn duty of this glorious day ” — the tears stood in 
the eyes of the poor gentleman as he said the words. 

Let us go among them ; we have to find a place in 
some division for this new recruit — give me your 
hand.” 

Gashford slid his cold insidious palm into his master’s 


232 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


grasp, and so, hand in hand, and followed still by Bar- 
naby and his mother too, they mingled with the con« 
course. 

They had by this time taken to their singing again, 
and as their leader passed between their ranks, they 
raised their voices to their utmost. Many of those who 
were banded together to support the religion of their 
country, even unto death, had never heard a hymn or 
psalm in all their lives. But these fellows having for 
the most part strong lungs, and being naturally fond of 
singing, chanted any ribaldry or nonsense that occurred 
to them, feeling pretty certain that it would not be de- 
tected in the general chorus, and not caring very much 
if it were. Many of these voluntaries were sung under 
the very nose of Lord George Gordon, who, quite un- 
conscious of their burden, passed on with his usual stiff 
and solemn deportment, very much edified and delighted 
by the pious conduct of his followers. 

So they went on and on, up this line, down that, round 
the exterior of this circle, and on every side of that hol- 
low square ; and still there were lines, and squares, and 
circles out of number to review. The day being now 
intensely hot, and the sun striking down his fiercest rays 
upon the field, those who carried heavy banners began 
to grow faint and weary ; most of the number assembled 
were fain to pull off their neckcloths, and throw their 
coats and waistcoats open ; and some, towards the cen- 
tre, quite overpowered by the excessive heat, which was 
of course rendered more unendurable by the multitude 
around them, lay down upon the grass, and offered all 
they had about them for a drink of water. Still, no 
man left the ground, not even of those who were so dis- 
tressed ; still, Lord George, streaming from every pore, 


BAKNABY BUDGE. 


2:j3 

went on with Gasliford ; and still Barnaby and his 
mother followed close behind them. 

They had arrived at the top of a long line of some 
eight hundred men in single file, and Lord George had 
turned his head to look back, when a loud cry of recog- 
nition — in that peculiar and half-stifled tone which a 
voice has, when it is raised in the open air and in the 
midst of a great concourse of persons — was heard, and 
a man stepped with a shout of laughter from the rank, 
and smote Barnaby on the shoulders with his heavy 
hand. 

“ How now ! ” he cried. “ Barnaby liudge ! Why, 
where have you been hiding for these hundred years ! ” 
Barnaby had been thinking within himself that the 
smell of the trodden grass brought back his old days at 
cricket, when he was a young boy and played on Chig- 
well Green. Confused by this sudden and boisterous 
address, he stared in a bewildered manner at the man, 
and could scarcely say “ What I Hugh ! ” 

“ Hugh ! ” echoed the other ; “ ay, Hugh — Maypole 
Hugh ! You remember my dog ? He’s alive now, and 
will know you, I warrant. What, you wear the color, do 
you ? Well done ! Ha,' ha, ha ! ” 

“You know this young man, I see,” said Lord George. 
“ Know him, my lord ! as well as I know my own 
right hand. My captain knows him. We all know 
lim.” 

“ Will you take him into your division ? ” 

“ It hasn’t in it a better, nor a nimbler, nor a more 
active man, than Barnaby Rudge,” said Hugh; “ Show 
me the man who says it has ! Fall in, Barnaby. He 
shall march, my lord, between me and Dennis ; and he 
shall carry,” he added, taking a flag from the hand of a 


234 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


tired man who tendered it, “ the gayest silken streamer 
in this valiant army.” 

In the name of God, no ! ” shrieked the widow, dart- 
ing forward. “ Barnaby — my lord — see — he’ll come 
back — Barnaby — Barnaby ! ” 

“ Women in the field ! ” cried Hugh, stepping be- 
tween them, and holding her otF. “ Holloa ! My cap- 
tain there ! ” 

“ What’s the matter here ? ” cried Simon Tappertit, 
bustling up in a great heat. “ Do you call this or- 
der ? ” 

“ Nothing like it, captain,” answered Hugh, still hold- 
ing her back with his outstretched hand. “ It’s against 
all orders. Ladies are carrying ofi* our gallant soldiers 
from their duty. The word of command, captain ! They’re 
filing off the ground. Quick ! ” 

“ Close ! ” cried Simon, with the whole power of his 
lungs. “ Form ! March ! ” 

She was thrown to the ground ; the whole field was 
in motion ; Barnaby was whirled away into the heart 
of a dense mass of men, and she saw him no more. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


235 


\ 


CHAPTER XLIX. 

The mob had been divided from its first assemblage 
into four divisions : the London, the Westminster, the 
Southwark, and the Scotch. Each of these divisions 
being subdivided into various bodies, and these bodies 
being drawn up in various forms and figures, the gen- 
eral arrangement was, except to the few chiefs and 
leaders, as unintelligible as the plan of a great battle 
to the meanest soldier in the field. It was not without 
its method, however ; for, in a very short space of time 
after being put in motion, the crowd had resolved itself 
into three great parties, and were prepared, as had been 
arranged to cross the river by different bridges, and 
make for the House of Commons in separate detach- 
ments. 

At the head of that division which had Westminster 
Bridge for its approach to the scene of action. Lord 
George Gordon took his post ; M'ith Gashford at his 
right hand, and sundry ruffians of most unpromising ap- 
pearance, forming a kind of staff about him. The con- 
luct of a second party whose route lay by Blackfriars, 
'was intrusted to a committee of management, including 
perhaps a dozen men : while the third, which was to go 
by London Bridge, and through the main streets, in 
order that their numbers and their serious intentions 
might be the better known and appreciated by the cit- 
izens, was led by Simon Tappertit (assisted by a fev; 


236 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Bubalterns, selected from the Brotherhood of United 
Bull-dogs), Dennis the hangman, Hugh, and some oth- 
ers. 

The word of command being given, each of these 
great bodies took the road assigned to it, and departed 
on its way, in perfect order and profound silence. That 
which went through the City greatly exceeded the oth- 
ers in number, and was of such prodigious extent that 
when the rear began to move, the front v^as nearly four 
miles in advance, notwithstanding that the men marched 
three abreast and followed very close upon each other. 

At the head of this party, in the place where Hugh, 
in the madness of his humor, had stationed him, and 
walking between that dangerous companion and the 
hangman, went Barnaby ; as many a man among the 
thousands who looked on that day afterwards remem- 
bered well. Forgetful of all other things in the ecstasy 
of the moment, his face flushed and his eyes sparkling 
with delight, heedless of the weight of the great banner 
he carried, and mindful only of its flashing in the sun 
and rustling in the summer breeze, on he went, proud, 
happy, elated past all telling : — the only light-hearted, 
undesigning creature, inAhe whole assembly. 

“ What do you think of this ? ” asked Hugh, as they 
passed through the crowded streets, and looked up at the 
windows which were thronged with spectators. “ They 
have all turned out to see our flags and streamers. Eh, 
Barnaby ? Why, Barnaby’s the greatest man of all the 
pack ! His flag’s the largest of the lot, the brightest too. 
There’s nothing in the show, like Barnaby. All eyes 
are turned on him. Ha, jia, ha ! ” 

“ Don’t make that din, brother,” growled the hang-, 
man, glancing with no very approving eyes at Barnaby 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


237 


as he spoke : “ I hope he don’t think there’s nothing to 
be done, but carrying that there piece of blue rag, like 
a boy at a breaking-up. You’re ready for action I hope, 
eh ? You, I mean,” he added, nudging Barnaby roughly 
with his elbow. “ What are you staring at ? Why don’t 
you speak^ ” 

Barnaby had been gazing at his flag, and looked va- 
cantly from his questioner to Hugh. 

“ He don’t understand your way,” said the latter. 
“ Here, I’ll explain it to him. Barnaby old boy, attend 
to me.” 

“ I’ll attend,” said Barnaby, looking anxiously round ; 
“ but I wish I could see her somewhere.” 

“ See who ? ” demanded Dennis in a gruff tone. 
“ You a’n’t in love I hope, brother ? That a’n’t the 
sort of thing for us, you know. We mustn’t have no 
love here.” 

“ She would be proud indeed to see me now, eh, 
Hugh?” said Barnaby. “Wouldn’t it make her glad to 
see me at the head of this large show ? She’d cry with 
joy, I know she would. Where caii she be. She never 
sees me at my best, and what do I care to be gay and fine 
if she’s not by ? ” 

“ Why, what palaver’s this ? ” asked Mr. Dennis with 
supreme disdain. “We a’n’t got no sentimental members 
among us, I hope.” 

“ Don’t be uneasy, brother,” cried Hugh, “ he’s only 
talking of his mother.” 

“ Of his what ? ” said Mr. Dennis with a strong 
Dath. 

“ His mother.” 

“ And have I combined myself with this here section, 
and turned out on this here memorable day, to hear men 


238 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


talk about their mothers ! ” growled Mr. Dennis with ex- 
treme disgust. “ The notion of a man’s sweetheart’s 
bad enough, but a man’s mother!” — and here his dis- 
gust was so extreme that he spat upon the ground, and 
could say no more. 

“ Barnaby’s right,” cried Hugh with a grih, “ and 1 
say it. Lookee, bold lad. If she’s not here to see, it’s 
because I’ve provided for her, and sent half a dozen 
gentlemen, every one of ’em with a blue flag (but not 
half as fine as yours), to take her, in state, to a grand 
house all hung round with gold and silver banners, and 
everything else you please, where she’ll wait till you 
come, and want for nothing.” 

“ Ay ! ” said Barnaby, his face beaming with delight : 
“ have you indeed ? That’s a good hearing. That’s 
fine ! Kind Hugh ! ” 

“ But nothing to what will come, bless you,” retorted 
Hugh, with a wink at Dennis, who regarded his new 
companion in arms with great astonishment. 

“ No, indeed ? ” cried Barnaby. 

“ Nothing at all,” said Hugh. “ Money, cocked-hats 
and feathers, red-coats and gold lace ; all the fine things 
there are, ever were, or will be ; will belong to us if we 
are true to that noble gentleman — the best man in the 
world — carry our flags for a few days, and keep ’em safe. 
That’s all we’ve got to do.” 

“ Is that all ? ” cried Barnaby with glistening eyes, as 
he clutched his pole the tighter ; “ I warrant you I 
keep this one safe, then. You have put it in good 
bands. You know me, Hugh. Nobody shall wrest this 
flag away.” 

“Well said!” cried Hugh. “Ha, ha! Nobly said! 
That's the old stout Barnaby, that I have climbed and 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


239 


leaped with, many and many a day — I knew I was not 
mistaken in Barnaby. — Don’t you see man,” he added 
in a whisper, as he slipped to the other side of Dennis, 
“ that the lad’s a natural, and can be got to do anything, 
if you take him the right way. Letting alone the fun 
he is, he’s worth a dozen men, in earnest, as you’d find 
if you tried a fall with him. Leave him to me. You 
hall soon see whether he’s of use or not.” 

Mr. Dennis received these explanatory remarks with 
many nods and winks, and softened his behavior towards 
Barnaby from that moment. Hugh, laying his finger 
on his nose, stepped back into his former place, and they 
proceeded in silence. 

It was between two and three o’clock in the afternoon 
when the three great parties met at Westminster, and, 
uniting into one huge mass, raised a tremendous shout. 
This was not only done in token of their presence, but 
as a signal to those on whom the task devolved, that it 
was time to take possession of the lobbies of both Houses, 
and of the various avenues of approach, and of the gal- 
lery stairs. To the last-named place, Hugh and Dennis, 
still with their pupil between them, rushed straightway ; 
Barnaby having given his flag into the hands of one of 
their own party, who kept them at the outer door. Their 
followers pressing on behind, they were borne as on a 
great wave to the very doors of the gallery, whence it 
was impossible to retreat, even if they had been so in- 
clined, by reason of the throng which choked up the 
passages. It is a familiar expression in describing a 
great crowd, that a person might have walked upon the 
people’s heads. In this case it was actually done ; for 
a boy who had by some means got among the concourse, 
and was in imminent danger of suffocation, climbed to 


240 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


the shoulders of a man beside him and walked upon 
the people’s hats and heads into the open street ; trav- 
ersing in his passage the whole length of two staircases 
and a long gallery. Nor was the swarm without less 
dense ; for a basket which had been tossed into the 
crowd, was jerked from head to head, and shoulder to 
shoulder, and went spinning and whirling on above them, 
until it was lost to view, without ever once falling in 
among them or coming near the ground. 

Through this vast throng, sprinkled doubtless here 
and there with honest zealots, but composed for the most 
part of the very scum and refuse of London, whose 
growth was fostered by bad criminal laws, bad prison 
regulations, and the worst conceivable police, such of the 
members of both Houses of Parliament as had not taken 
the precaution to be already at their posts, were com- 
pelled to fight and force their way. Their carriages 
were stopped and broken ; the wheels wrenched off ; the 
glasses shivered to atoms ; the panels beaten in ; driv- 
ers, footmen, and masters, pulled from their seats and 
rolled in the mud. Lords, commoners, and reverend 
bishops, with little distinction of person or party, were 
kicked and pinched and hustled ; passed from hand to 
hand through various stages of ill-usage ; and sent to 
their fellow-senators at last with their clothes hanging in 
ribbons about them, their bagwigs torn off, themselves 
speechless and breathless, and their persons covered with 
the powder which had been cuffed and beaten out of 
their hair. One lord was so long in the hands of the 
populace, that the Peers as a body resolved to sally 
forth and rescue him, and were in the act of doing so, 
when he happily appeared among them covered with 
dirt and bruises, and hardly to be recognized by those 


I3AKNA1JY KUDGE. 


241 


who knew him best. The noise and uproar were on the 
increase every moment. The air was filled with execra- 
tions, hoots, and bowlings. The mob raged and roared 
like a mad monster as it was, unceasingly, and each new 
outrage served to swell its fury. 

Within doors, matters were even yet more threaten- 
ing. Lord George — preceded by a man who carried 
the immense petition on a porter’s knot through the 
lobby to the door of the House of Commons, where it 
was received by two officers of the house who rolled it up 
to the table ready for presentation — had taken his seat 
at an early hour, before the Speaker went to prayers. 
His followers pouring in at the same time, the lobby 
and all the avenues were immediately filled, as we have 
seen. Thus the members w'ere not only attacked in 
their passage through the streets, but were set upon 
within the very walls of Parliament ; while the tumult, 
both wdthin and without, was so great, that those who 
attempted to speak could scarcely hear their own voices : 
far less consult upon the course it would be wise to 
take in such extremity, or animate each other to dig- 
nified and firm resistance. So sure as any member, just 
arrived, with dress disordered and dishevelled hair, came 
struggling through the crowd in the lobby, it yelled and 
screamed in triumph ; and when the door of the House 
partially and cautiously opened by those within for his 
admission, gave them a momentary glimpse of the in- 
terior, they grew more wild and savage, like beasts a 
the sight of prey, and made a rush against the portal, 
which strained its locks and bolts in their staples, and 
shook the very beams. 

The strangers’ gallery, which was immediately above 
the door of the House, had been ordered to be closed 
16 


VOIi. II. 


242 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


on the first rumor of disturbance, and was empty; save 
that now and then Lord George took his seat there, for 
the convenience of coming to the head of the stairs 
which led to it, and repeating to the people what had 
passed within. It was on these stairs that Barnaby, 
Hugh, and Dennis were posted. There were two flights, 
short, steep, and narrow, running parallel to each otlier, 
and leading to two little doors communicating with a low 
passage which opened on the gallery. Between them 
was a kind of well, or unglazed skylight, for the admis- 
sion of light and air into the lobby, which might be 
some eighteen or twenty feet below. 

Upon one of these little staircases — not that at the 
head of which Lord George appeared from time to time, 
but the other — Gashford stood with his elbow on the 
banister, and his cheek resting on his hand, with his 
usual crafty aspect. Whenever he varied this attitude 
in the slightest degree — so much as by the gentlest mo- 
tion’ of his arm — the uproar was certain to increase, not 
merely there, but in the lobby below ; from which place, 
no doubt, some man who acted as fugleman to the rest, 
was constantly looking up and w^atching him. 

“ Order ! ” cried Hugh, in a voice which made itself 
heard even above the roar and tumult, as Lord George 
appeared at the top of the staircase. “ News ! News 
from my lord ! ” 

The noise continued, notwithstanding his appearance, 
until Gashford looked round. There was silence imme- 
diately — even among the people in the passages with- 
out, and on the other staircases, who could neither see 
Qor hear, but to whom, notwithstanding, the signal was 
conveyed with marvellous rapidity. 

“ Gentlemen,” said Lord George, who was very pale 


BAKNABY BUDGE. 


243 


and agitated, “ We must be firm. Tliey talk of delays, 
but we must have no delays. They talk of taking your 
petition into consideration next Tuesday, but we must 
have it considered now. Present appearances look bad 
for our success, but we must succeed and will ! ” ^ 

“ We must succeed and will ! ” echoed the crowd 
And so among their shouts and cheers and other cries, ■ 
he bowed to them and retired, and presently came back 
again. There was another gesture from Gashford, and 
a dead silence directly. 

“ I am afraid,” he said, this time, “ that we have little 
reason, gentlemen, to hope for any redress from the pro- 
ceedings of Parliament. But we must redress our own 
grievances, we must meet again, we must put our trust 
in Providence, and it will bless our endeavors.” 

This speech being a little more temperate than the 
last, was not so favorably received. When the noise 
and exasperation were at their height, he came back 
once more, and told them that the alarm had gone forth 
for many miles round ; that when the King heard of 
their assembling togetlier in that great bod^ he had 
no doubt. His Majesty would send down private orders 
to have their wishes complied with ; and — with the 
manner of his speech as childish, irresolute, and uncer- 
tain as his matter — was proceeding in this strain, when 
fwo gentlemen suddenly appeared at the door where 
he stood, and pressing past him and coming a step or 
two lower down upon the stairs, confronted the people. 

The boldness of this action quite took them by sur- 
prise. They were not the less disconcerted, when one 
of the gentlemen, turning to Lord George, spoke thus — - 
in a loud voice that they might hear him well, but quite 
coolly and collectedly. 


244 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ You may tell these people, if you please, my lord, 
that I am General Conway of whom they have heard; 
and that I oppose this petition, and all their proceed- 
ings, and yours. I am a soldier, you may tell them, 
and I will protect the freedom of this place with my 
Bword. You see, my lord, that the members of this 
House are all in arms to-day ; you know that the en- 
trance to it is a narrow one ; you cannot be ignorant 
that there are men within these walls who are deter- 
mined to defend that pass to the last, and before whom 
many lives must fall if your adherents persevere. Have 
a care what you do.” 

“ And my Lord George,” said the other gentleman, 
addressing him in like manner, “ I desire them to hear 
this, from me — Colonel Gordon — your near relation. 
If a man among this crowd, whose uproar strikes us 
deaf, crosses the threshold of the House of Commons, 
I swear to run my sword that moment — not into his, 
but into your body ! ” 

With that, they stepped back again, keeping their 
faces towards the crowd ; took each an arm of the mis- 
guiled nobleman ; drew him into the passage, and shut 
the door ; which they directly locked and fastened on 
the inside. 

This was so quickly done, and the demeanor of both 
gentlemen — who were not young men either — was so 
gallant and resolute, that the crowd faltered and stared 
at each other with irresolute and timid looks. Many 
tried to turn towards the door ; some of the faintest- 
hearted cried that they had best go back, and called 
to those behind to give way ; and the panic and con- 
fusion were increasing rapidly, when Gashford whis- 
pered Hugh. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


245 


“ What now ! ” Hugh roared aloud, turning towards 
them. “ Why go back ? Where can you do better than 
here, boys ! One good rush against these doors and one 
below at the same time, will do the business. Rush on, 
then ! As to the door below, let those stand back who are 
afraid. Let those who are not afraid, try who shall be 
the first to pass it. Here goes ! Look out down there ! ” 

Without the delay of an instant, he threw himself 
lieadlong over the banisters into the lobby below. He 
had hardly touched the ground when Barnaby was at 
his side. The chaplain’s assistant, and some members 
who were imploring the people to retire, immediately 
withdrew ; and then, with a great shout, both crowds 
threw themselves against the doors pell-mell, and be- 
sieged the House in earnest. 

At that moment, when a second onset must have 
brought them into collision with those who stood on 
the defensive within, in which case great loss of life and 
bloodshed would inevitably have ensued, — the hindmost 
portion of the crowd gave way, and the rumor spread 
from mouth- to mouth that a messenger had been de- 
spatched by water for the military, w^ho were forming in 
the street. Fearful of sustaining a charge in the narrow 
passages in which they were so closely wedged together, 
the throng poured out as impetuously as they had fiocked 
in. As the whole stream turned at once, Barnaby and 
Hugh went with it : and so, fighting and struggling and 
trampling on fallen men, and being trampled on in turn 
themselves, they and the whole mass floated by degree, 
into the open street, where a large detacliment of the 
Guards, both horse and foot, came hurrying up ; clearing 
the ground before them so rapidly that the people seemed 
to mel' away as they advanced. 


246 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


The word of conimaiid to halt being given, the soldiers 
formed across the street ; the rioters, breathless and ex- 
hausted with their late exertions, formed likewise,, though 
in a very irregular and disorderly manner. The com- 
manding officer rode hastily into the open space between 
the two bodies, accompanied by a magistrate and an 
officer of the House of Commons, for whose accommo- 
dation a couple of troopers had hastily dismounted. The 
Riot Act was read, but not a man stirred. 

In the first rank of the insurgents, Barnaby and Hugh 
stood side by side. Somebody had thrust into Barnaby’s 
liands when he came out into the street, his precious 
flag; which, being now rolled up and tied round the 
pole, looked like a giant quarter-staff as he grasped it 
firmly and stood upon his guard. If ever man believed 
with his whole heart and soul that he was engaged in a 
just cause, and that he was bound to stand by his leader 
to the last, poor Barnaby believed it of himself and Lord 
George Gordon. 

After an ineffectual attempt to make himself heard, 
the magistrate gave the word and the Horse Guards 
came riding in among the crowd. But, even then, he 
galloped here and there, exhorting the people to dis- 
perse ; and, although heavy stones were throw;i at the 
men, and some were desperately cut and bruised, they 
had no orders but to make prisoners of such of the 
rioters as were the most active, and to drive the people 
back with the flat of their sabres. As the horses came 
in among them, the throng gave way at many points, and 
the Guards, following up their advantage, were rapidly 
clearing the ground, when two or three of the foremost, 
who were in a manner cut off from the rest by the people 
closing round them, made straight towards Barnaby and 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


247 


Hugh, who had no doubt been pointed out as the two 
men who dropped into the lobby : laying about them 
now with some effect, and inflicting on the more turbu- 
lent of their opponents, a few slight flesh wounds’, under 
the influence of which a man dropped, here and there, 
into the arms of his fellows, amid much groaning and 
confusion. 

At the sight of gashed and bloody faces, seen for a 
moment in the crowd, then hidden by the press around 
them, Barnaby turned pale and sick. But he stood his 
ground, and grasping his pole more firmly yet, kept his 
eye fixed upon the nearest soldier — nodding his head 
meanwhile, as Hugh, with a scowling visage, whispered 
in his ear. 

The soldier came spurring on, making his horse rear 
as the people pressed about him, cutting at the hands of 
those who would have grasped his rein and forced his 
charger back, and waving to his comrades to follow — 
and still Barnaby, without retreating an inch, waited for 
his coming. Some called to him to fly, and some were 
in the very act of closing round him, to prevent his being 
taken, when the pole swept the air ’above the people’s 
heads, and the man’s saddle was empty in an instant. 

Then, he and Hugh turned and fled ; the crowd open- 
ing to let them pass, and closing up again so quickly that 
there was no clew to the course they had taken. Pant- 
ing for breath, hot, dusty, and exhausted with fatigue, 
they reached the river side in safety, and getting into a 
boat with all despatch were soon -out of any immediate 
danger. 

As they glided down the river, they plainly heard the 
people cheering ; and supposing they might have forced 
the soldiers to retreat, lay upon their oars for a few 


248 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


minutes, uncertain whether to return or not. But the 
crowd passing along Westminster Bridge, soon assured 
them that the populace were dispersing; and Hugh 
rightly ‘guessed from this, that they had cheered the 
magistrate for offering to dismiss the military on con- 
dition of their immediate departure to their several 
homes, and that he and Barnaby were better where 
they were. He advised, therefore, that they should 
proceed to Blackfriars, and, going ashore at the bridge, 
make the best of their way to The Boot ; where there 
was not only good entertainment and safe lodging, but 
where they would certainly be joined by many of their 
late companions. Barnaby assenting, they decided on 
this course of action, and pulled for Blackfriars ac- 
cordingly. 

They landed at a critical time, and fortunately for 
themselves at the right moment. For, coming into 
Fleet-street, they found it in an unusual stir ; and in- 
quiring the cause, were told that a body of Horse Guards 
had just galloped past, and that they were escorting some 
rioters whom they had made prisoners, to Newgate for 
safety. Not at all ill-pleased to have so narrowly 
escaped the cavalcade, they lost no more time in ask- 
ing questions, but hurried to The Boot with as much 
speed as Hugh considered it prudent to make, without 
appearing singular or attracting an inconvenient share 
of public notice. , 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


249 


CHAPTER L. 

They were among the first to reach the tavern, but 
they had not been there many minutes, when several 
groups of men who had formed part of the crowd, came 
straggling in. Among them were Simon Tappertit and 
Mr. Dennis; both of whom, but especially the latter, 
greeted Barnaby with the utmost warmth, and paid him 
many compliments on the prowess he had shown. 

“ Which,” said Dennis, with an oath, as he rested his 
bludgeon in a corner with his hat upon it, and took his 
seat at the same table with them, “ it does me good to 
think of. There was a opportunity ! But it led to 
nothing. For my part, I don’t know what would. 
There’s no spirit among the people in these here 
times. Bring something to eat and drink here. I’m 
disgusted with humanity.” 

“ On what account ? ” asked Mr. Tappertit, who had 
been quenching his fiery face in a half gallon can. 
“ Don’t you consider this a good beginning, mister ? ” 

“ Give me security that it a’n’t a ending,” rejoined the 
hangman. “ When that soldier went down, we might 
have made London ours ; but no ; — we stand, and gape, 
and look on — the justice (I wish he had had a bullet in 
each eye, as he would have had, if we’d gone to work 
my way) says ‘ My lads, if you’ll give me your word to 
disperse, I’ll order off the military,’ — our people sets up 
a hurrah, throws up the game with the winning cards in 


250 


BAKNABY BUDGE. 


their hands, and skulks away like a pack of tame curs as 
they are. Ah,” said the hangman, in a tone of deep dis- 
gust, “ it makes me blush for my feller creeturs. I wish 
I had been born a ox, I do ! ” 

“ You’d have been quite as agreeable a character if 
you had been, I think,” returned Simon Tappertit, going 
out in a lofty manner. 

“ Don’t be too sure of that,” rejoined the hangman, 
calling after him ; “ if I was a horned animal at the pres- 
ent moment, with the smallest grain of sense. I’d toss 
every man in this company, excepting them two,” mean- 
ing Hugh and Barnaby, “ for his manner of conducting 
himself this day.” 

With which mournful review of their proceedings, 
Mr. Dennis sought consolation in cold boiled beef and 
beer ; but without at all relaxing the grim and dissatis- 
fied expression of his face, the gloom of which was 
rather deepened than dissipated by their grateful in- 
fluence. 

The company who were thus libelled might have re- 
taliated by strong words, if not by blows, but they were 
dispirited and worn out. The greater part of them had 
fasted since morning ; all had suffered extremely from 
the excessive heat ; and between the day’s shouting, ex- 
ertion, and excitement, many had quite lost their voices, 
and so much of their strength that they could hardly 
stand. Then they were uncertain what to do next, 
fearful of the consequences 'of what they had done al- 
ready, and sensible that after all they had carried no 
point, but had indeed left matters worse than they had 
found them. Of those who had come to The Boot, 
many dropped off within an hour ; such of them as 
were really honest and sincere, never, after the morn- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


251 


ing’s experience, to return, or to hold any communica- 
tion with their late companions. Others remained but 
to refresh themselves, and then went home desponding ; 
others who had theretofore been regular in their attend- 
ance, avoided the place altogether. The half-dozen pris- 
oners whom the Guards had taken, were magnified by 
report into half a hundred at least ; and their friends, be- 
ing faint and sober, so slackened in their energy, and so 
drooped beneath these dispiriting influences, that by 
eight o’clock in the evening, Dennis, Hugh, and Bar- 
naby, were left alone. Even they were fast asleep upon 
the benches, when Gashford’s entrance roused them. 

“ Oh ! You are here then ” said the secretary. • “ Dear 
me!” 

Why, where should we be, Muster Gashford !” Den- 
nis rejoined as he rose into a sitting posture. 

“ Oh nowhere, nowhere,” he returned with excessive 
mildness. “ The streets are filled with blue cockades. I 
rather thought you might have been among them. I am 
glad you are not.” 

“ You have orders for us, master, then ? ” said Hugh. 

“ Oh dear, no. Not I. No orders, my good fellow. 
What orders should I have ? You are not in my ser- 
vice.” 

“ Muster Gashford,” remonstrated Dennis, “ we belong 
to the cause, don’t we ? ” 

“ The cause ! ” repeated the secretary, looking at him 
in a sort of abstraction. “ There is no cause. The cause 
is lost.” 

“ Lost ! ” 

“ Oh yes. You have heard, I suppose The petition 
is rejected by a hundred and ninety-two, to six. It’s 
quite final. We might have spared ourselves some 


252 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


trouble. That, and my lord’s vexation, are the only 
circumstances I regret. I am quite satisfied in all other 
respects.” 

As he said this, he took a penknife from his pocket, 
and putting his hat upon his knee, began to busy him- 
self in ripping oflT the blue cockade which he had worn 
all day ; at the same time humming a psalm tune which 
had been very popular in the morning, and dwelling on 
it with a gentle regret. 

His two adherents looked at each other, and at him, as 
if they were at a loss how to pursue the subject. At 
length Hugh, after some elbowing and winking between 
himself and Mr. Dennis, ventured to stay his hand, and 
to ask him Avhy he. meddled with that ribbon in his hat. 

“ Because,” said the secretary, looking up with * 
something between a snarl and a smile, “ because to 
sit still and wear it, or fall asleep and wear it, or run 
away and wear it, is a mockery. That’s all friend.” 

“What would you have us do, master!” cried Hugh. 

“ Nothing,” returned Gashford, shrugging his shoul- 
ders ; “ nothing. When my lord w^as reproached and 
threatened for standing by you, I, as a prudent man, 
would have had you do nothing. When the soldiers 
were trampling you under their horses’ feet, I would 
have had you do nothing. When one of them was 
struck down by a daring hand, and I saw confusion 
and dismay in all their faces, I would have had you 
io nothing — just what you did, in short. This is the 
young man who had so little prudence and so much bold- 
ness. Ah ! 1 am sorry for him.” 

“ Sorry, master 1 ” cried Hugh. 

“ Sorry, Muster Gashford ! ” echoed Dennis. 

“ In case there should be a proclamation out to-mor- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


2;33 


row, offering five hundred pounds, or some such trifle, 
for his apprehension ; and in case it should include an- 
other man who dropped into the, lobby from the stairs 
above,” said Gashford, coldly ; “ still, do nothing.” 

“Fire and fury, master!” cried Hugh, starting up. 
“ What have we done, that you should talk to us like 
this!” 

“ Nothing,” returned Gashford with a sneer. “ If you 
are cast into prison ; if the young man ” — here he 
looked hard at Barnaby’s attentive face — “is dragged 
from us and from his friends ; perhaps from people 
whom he loves, and whom his death would kill ; is 
thrown into jail, brought out and hanged before their 
eyes ; still, do nothing. You’ll find it your best policy, 
I have no doubt.” 

“ Come on 1 ” cried Hugh, striding towards the door. 
“ Dennis — Barnaby — come on ! ” ' 

“ Where ? To do what ? ” said Gashford, slipping 
past him, and standing with his back against it. 

“ Anywhere ! Anything I ” cried Hugh. “ Stand aside, 
master, or the window will serve our turn as well. Let 
us out ! ” 

“ Ha, ha, ha 1 You are of such — of such an im- 
petuous nature,” said Gashford, changing his manner 
for one of the utmost good-fellowship and the pleasant- 
est raillery ; “ you are such an excitable creature — but 
you’ll drink with me before you go ? ” 

“ Oh, yes — certainly,” growled Dennis, dravVing his 
sleeve across his thirsty lips. “ No malice, brother. 
Drink with Muster Gashford 1 ” 

Hugh wiped his heated brow, and relaxed into a 
smile. The artful secretary laughed outright. 

“ Some liquor here ! Be quick, or he’ll not stop, even 


254 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


for that Ho is a man of such desperate ardor ! ” said . 
the smooth secretary, whom Mr. Dennis corroborated 
with sundry nods and- muttered oaths — “ Once roused, 
he is a fellow of such fierce determination ! ” 

Hugh poised his sturdy arm aloft, and clapping Bar- 
naby on the back, bade him fear nothing. They shook 
hands ‘together — poor Barnaby evidently possessed with 
the idea that he was among the most virtuous and dis- 
interested heroes in the world — and Gashford laughed 
again. 

“ I hear,” he said smoothly, as he stood among them 
with a great measure of liquor in his hand, and filled 
their glasses as quickly and as often as they chose, “ I 
hear — but I cannot say whether it be true or false — 
that the men who are loitering in the streets to-night, are 
half disposed to pull down a Romish chapel or two, and 
that they only want leaders. I even heard mention of 
those in Duke Street, Lincoln’s-Inn Fields, and in War- 
wick Street, Golden Square ; but common report, you 
know — You are not going ? ” 

— “ To do nothing, master, eh ? ” cried Hugh. “ No 
jails and halter for Barnaby and me. They must be 
frightened out of that. Leaders are wanted, are they ? 
Now boys ! ” 

“ A most impetuous fellow ! ” cried the secretary. 
“ Ha, ha ! A courageous, boisterous, most vehement 
fellow I A man who ” — 

There was no need to finish the sentence, for they had 
rushed out of the house, and were far beyond hearing. 
He stopped in the middle of a laugh, listened, drew on 
liis gloves, and, clasping his hands behind him, paced the 
desei’ted room for a long time, then bent his steps tow- 
ards the busy town, and walked into the streets. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


255 


They were filled with people, for the rumor of that 
day^s proceedings had made a great noise. Those per- 
sons who did not care to leave home, were at their doors 
or windows, and one topic of discourse prevailed on every 
side. Some reported that the riots were effectually put 
down ; others that they had broken out again : some said 
that Lord George Gordon had been sent under a strong 
guard to the Tower ; others, that an attempt had been 
made upon the King’s life, that the soldiers had been again 
called out, and that the noise of musketry in a distant 
part of the town had been plainly heard within an hour. 
As it grew darker, these stories became more direful and 
mysterious ; and often, when some frightened passenger 
ran past with tidings that the rioters were not far off, 
and were coming up, the doors were shut and barred, 
lower windows made secure, and as much consterna- 
tion engendered, as if the city were invaded by a for- 
eign army. 

Gashford walked stealthily about, listening to all he 
heard, and diffusing or confirming, whenever he had an 
opportunity, such false intelligence as , suited his own 
purpose ; and, busily occupied in this way, turned into 
Holborn for the twentieth time, when a great many 
women and children came flying along the street — 
often panting and looking back — and the confused mur- 
mur of numerous voices struck upon his ear. Assured 
by these tokens, and by the red light which began to 
flash upon the houses on either side, that some of his 
friends were indeed ^approaching, he begged a moment’s 
shelter at a door which opened as he passed, and run- 
ning with some other persons to an upper window, 
looked out upon the crowd. 

They had torches among them, and the chief faces 


256 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


were distinctly visible. Tliat they had been engaged in 
the destruction of some building was sufliciently appar- 
ent, and that it was a Catholic place of worship was 
evident from the spoils they bore as trophies, which were 
easily recognizable for the vestments of priests, and rich 
fragments of altar furniture. Covered with soot, and 
dirt, and dust, and lime ; their garments torn to rags ; 
their hair hanging wildly about them ; their hands and 
faces jagged and bleeding with the wounds of rusty 
nails ; Barnaby, Hugh, and Dennis hurried on before 
them all, like hideous madmen. After them, the dense 
throng came fighting on : some singing ; some shouting 
in triumph ; some quarrelling among themselves ; some 
menacing the spectators as they passed ; some with great 
wooden fragments, on which they spent their rage, as if 
they had been alive, rending them limb from limb, and 
hurling the scattered morsels high into the air ; some in 
a drunken state, unconscious of the hurts they had re- 
ceived from falling bricks, and stones, and beams ; one 
borne upon a shutter, in the very midst, covered with a 
dingy cloth, a senseless, ghastly heap. Thus — a vision 
of coarse faces, with here and there a blot of flaring 
smoky light ; a dream of demon heads and savage eyes, 
and sticks and iron bars uplifted in the air, and whirled 
about ; a bewildering horror, in which so much was 
seen, and yet so little, which seemed so long and yet so 
short, in which there were so many phantoms, not to be 
forgotten all through life, and yet so many things that 
could not be observed in one distracting glimpse — it 
flitted onward and was gone. 

As it passed away upon its work of wrath and ruin, 
a piercing scream was heard. A knot of persons ran 
towards the spot ; Gashford, who just then emerged into 


BARN A BY RUDGE. 


257 


the street, among them. He was on the outskirts of the 
little concourse, and could not see or hear what passed 
within ; but one who had a better place, informed him 
that a widow woman had descried her son among the 
rioters. 

“Is that all?” said the secretary, turning his face 
homewards. “ Well ! I think this looks a little more 
like business!” ' - •' 


you n. 17 




U' is- 


2o8 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


CHAPTER LI. 

Promising as these outrages were to Gashford’s view, 
and much like business as they looked, they extended 
that night no farther. The soldiers w'ere again called 
out, again they took half a dozen prisoners, and again 
the crowd dispersed after a short and bloodless scuffle. 
Hot and drunken though they were, they had not yet 
broken all bounds and set all law and government at de- 
Ban ce. Something of their habitual deference to the 
authority erected by society for its own preservation yet 
remained among them, and had its majesty been vindi- 
cated in time, the secretary would have had to digest a 
bitter disappointment. 

By midnight, the streets were clear and quiet, and, 
save that there stood in tw'o parts of the town, a heap 
of nodding walls and pile of rubbish, where there had 
been at sunset a rich and handsome building, everything 
wore its usual aspect. Even the Catholic gentry and 
tradesmen, of whom there were many, resident in differ- 
ent parts of the City and its suburbs, had no fear for 
their lives or property, and but little indignation for the 
wrong they had already sustained in the plunder and 
destruction of their temples of worship. An honest 
confidence in the government under whose protection 
they had lived for many years, and a well-founded reli- 
ance on the good feeling and right thinking of the great 
mass of the community, with whom, notwithstanding 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


250 


..heir religious differences, they were every day in habits 
of confidential, affectionate, and friendly intercourse, re- 
assured them, even under the excesses that had been 
committed; and convinced them that they who were 
Protestants in anything but the name, were no ipore to 
be considered as abettors of these disgraceful occur- 
rences, than they themselves were chargeable with the 
uses of the block, the rack, the gibbet, and the stake, in 
cruel Mary’s reign. 

The clock was on the stroke of one, when Gabriel 
Varden, with his lady and Miss Miggs, sat waiting in 
the little parlor. This fact ; the toppling wicks of the 
dull, wasted candles ; the silence that prevailed ; and 
above all the nightcaps of botli maid and matron, were 
sufficient evidence that they had been prepared for bed 
some time ago, and had some strong reason for sitting 
up so far beyond their usual hour. 

If any other corroborative testimony had been re- 
quired, it would have been abundantly furnished in the 
actions of Miss Miggs, who, having arrived at that rest- 
less state and sensitive condition of the nervous system 
which are the result of long watching, did, by a constant 
rubbing and tweaking of her nose, a perpetual change 
of position (arising from the sudden growth of imagin- 
ary knots and knobs in her chair), a frequent friction of 
her eyebrows, the incessant recurrence of a small cough, 
a small groan, a gasp, a sigh, a sniflT, a spasmodic start, 
and by other demonstrations of that nature, so file down 
and rasp, as it were, the patience of the locksmith, that 
after lookinj; at her in silence for some time, he at last 
broke out into this apostrophe : 

“ Miggs, my good girl, go to bed — do go to bed. 
You’re really worse than the dripping of a hundred 


260 


• BARNABY RUDGE. 


water-butts outside the window, or the scratching of. as 
many mice behind the wainscot. I can’t bear it Do 
go to bed, Miggs. To oblige me — do.” 

“ You haven’t got nothing to untie, sir,” returned Miss 
Miggs, “ and therefore your requests does not surprise 
me. But Missis has — and while you set up, mim ” — 
she added, turning to the locksmith’s wife, “ I couldn’t, 
no not if twenty times the quantity of cold water was 
aperiently running down my back at this moment, go to 
bed with a quiet spirit.” 

Having spoken these w^ords. Miss Miggs made divers 
efforts to rub her shoulders in an impossible place, and 
shivered from head to foot ; thereby giving the beholders 
to understand that the imaginar/ cascade was still in full 
flow, but that a sense of duty upheld her under that, and 
all other sufferings, and nerved her to endurance. 

Mrs. Varden- being too sleepy to speak, and Miss 
Miggs having, as the phrase is, said her say, the lock- 
smith had nothing for it but to sigh and be as quiet as 
he could. 

But to be quiet with such a basilisk before him, was 
impossible. If he looked another way, it was worse to 
feel that she w'as rubbing her cheek, or twitching her 
ear, or winking her eye, or making all kinds of extraor- 
dinary shapes with her nose, than to see her do it. If 
she was for a moment free from any of these complaints, 
it was only because of her foot being asleep, or of her 
arm having got the fidgets, or of her leg being doubled 
up wdth the cramp, or of some other horrible disorder 
whieh racked her whole frame. If she did enjoy a 
moment’s ease, then with her eyes shut and her mouth 
wide open, she would be seen to sit very stiff and up- 
right in her chair ; then to nod a little way forward, and 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


261 


stop with a jerk ; then to nod a little farther forward, 
and stop with another jerk ; then to recover herself ; 
then to come forward again — lower — lower — lower 
— by very slow degrees, until, just as it seemed impos- 
sible that she could preserve her balance for another in- 
stant, and the locksmith was about to call out in an 
agony, to save her from dashing down upon her forehead 
and fracturing her skull, then all of a sudden and with- 
out the smallest notice, she would come upright and 
rigid again with her eyes open, and in her countenance 
an expression of defiance, sleepy but yet most obstinate, 
which plainly said, “ I’ve never once closed ’em since I 
looked at you last, and J’ll take my oath of it ! ” 

At length, after the clock had struck two, there was a 
sound at the street-door, as if somebody had fallen 
against the knocker by accident. Miss Miggs imme- 
diately jumping up and clapping her hands, cried with a 
drowsy mingling of the sacred and profane. Ally Looyer, 
mim ! there’s Simmuns’s knock ! ” 

“ Who’s there ? ” said Gabriel. 

“ Me ! ” cried the well-known voice of Mr. Tappertit. 
Gabriel opened the door, and gave him admission. 

He did not cut a very insinuating figure ; for a man 
of his stature suffers in a crowd ; and having been active 
in yesterday morning’s work, his dress was literally 
crushed from head to foot ; his hat being beaten out of 
all shape, and his shoes trodden down at heel like slip- 
pers. His coat fluttered in strips about him, the buckles 
were tom away both from his knees and feet, half his 
neckerchief was gone, and the bosom of his shirt was 
rent to tatters. Yet notwithstanding all these personal 
disadvantages ; despite his being very weak from heat 
and fatigue ; and so begrimed with mud and dust that 


262 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


he might have been in a case, for anything of the real 
texture (either of his skin or apparel) that the eye could 
discern ; he stalked haughtily into the parlor, and throw- 
ing himself into a chair, and endeavoring to thrust his 
hands into ‘the pockets of his small-clothes, which were 
turned inside out and displayed upon his legs, like tas- 
sels, surv'eyed the household with a gloomy dignity. 

“ Simon,” said the locksmith gravely, “ How comes it 
that you return home at this time of night, and in this 
condition? Give me an assurance that yon have not 
been among the rioters, and I am satisfied.” 

“ Sir,” replied Mr. Tappertit, with a contemptuous look, 
“I wonder at your assurance in ij^aking such demands.” 

“You have been drinking,” said the locksmith. 

“As a general principle, and in the most offensive 
sense of the words, sir,” returned his journeyman with 
great self-possession, “I consider you a liar. In that 
last observation you have unintentionally — uninten- 
tionally sir — struck upon the truth.” 

“ Martha,” said the locksmith, turning to his wife, and 
shaking his head sorrowfully, while a smile at the ab- 
surd figure before him still played upon his open face, 
“ I trust it may turn out that this poor lad is not the 
victim of the knaves and fools we have so often had 
words about, and who have done so much harm to-day. 
If he has been at Warwick Street or Duke Street to- 
night ” — 

“ He has been at neither, sir,” cried INIr. Tappertit in 
a loud voice, which he suddenly dropped into a whisper 
as he repeated, with eyes fixed upon the locksmith, “ he 
has been at neither.” 

“I aiii glad of it, with all my heart,” said the locksmith 
in a serious tone ; “ for if he bad been, and it could be 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


263 


proved against him, Martha, your Great Association 
would have been to him the cart that draws men to the 
gallows and leaves them hanging in the air. It would, 
as sure as we’re alive ! ” 

Mrs. Varden was too much scared by Simon’s altered 
manner and appearance, and by the accounts of the 
rioters which had reached her ears that night, to offer 
any retort, or to have recourse to her usual matrimonial 
policy. Miss Miggs wrung her hands, and wept. 

“ He was not at Duke Street or at Warwick Street, 
G. Varden,” said Simon, sternly ; “but he was at West- 
minster. Perhaps, sir, he kicked a county member, per- 
haps, sir, he tapped a lord — you may stare, sii’, I repeat 
it — blood flowed from noses, and perhaps he tapped a 
lord. Who knows ? This,” he added, putting his hand 
into his waistcoat-pocket, and taking out a large tooth, 
at the sight of which both Miggs and Mrs. Varden 
screamed, “ this was a bishop’s. Beware, G. Varden ! ” 

“ Now, I would rather,” said the locksmith hastily, 
“ have paid five hundred pounds, than had this come to 
pass. You idiot, do you know what peril you stand 
in.?” 

“ I know it, sir,” replied his journeyman, “ and it is 
my glory. I was there, everybody saw me there. I 
was conspicuous and prominent. I will abide the con- 
sequences.” 

The locksmith, really disturbed and agitated, paced to 
and fro in silence — glancing at his former ’prentice 
every now and then — and at length stopping before 
him, said : — 

“ Get to bed, and sleep for a couple of hours that you 
may wake penitent, and with some of your senses about 
70U. Be sorry for wlvat you have done, and we will try 


264 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


to save you. If I call him by five o’clock,” said Varden, 
turning hurriedly to his wife, “and he washes himself 
clean and changes his dress, he may get to the Tower 
Stairs, and away by the Gravesend tide-boat, before any 
search is made for him. From there he can easily get 
on to Canterbury, where your cousin will give him work 
till this storm has blown over. I am not sure that I do 
right in screening him from the punishment he deserves, 
but he has lived in this house, man and boy, for a dozen 
years, and I should be sorry if for this one day’s work 
he made a miserable end. Lock the front-door, Miggs, 
and show no light towards the street when you go up- 
stall's. Quick, Simon ! Get to bed ! ” 

“And do you suppose, sir,” retorted Mr. Tappertit, 
with a thickness and slowness of speech which contrasted 
forcibly with the rapidity and earnestness of his kind- 
hearted master — “ and do you suppose, sir, that I am 
base and mean enough to accept your servile proposi- 
tion ? — Miscreant ! ” 

“ Whatever you please, Sim, but get to bed. Every 
minute is of consequence. The light here, Miggs ! ” 

“ Yes, yes, oh do ! Go to bed directly,” cried the two 
women together. 

Mr. Tappertit stood upon his feet, and pushing his 
chair away to show that he needed no assistance, an- 
swered, swaying himself to and fro, and managing his 
head as if it had no connection whatever with his 
body : — 

‘ “You spoke of Miggs, sir — Miggs may be smoth- 
ered ! ” 

“ Oh Simmun ! ” ejaculated that young lady in a faint 
voice. “ Oh mim ! Oh sir ! Oh goodness gracious, 
what a turn he has give me ! ”• 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


2G5 


“ This family may all be smothered, sir,” returned Mr. 
Tappertit, after glancing at her with a smile of ineffable 
disdain, “ excepting Mrs. V. I have come here, sir, for 
her sake, this night. Mrs. Varden, take this piece of 
paper. It’s a protection, ma’am. You may need it.” 

With these words he held out at arm’s length, a dirty, 
crumpled scrap of writing. The locksmith took it from 
him, opened it, and read as follow^s : — 

“ All good friends to our cause, I hope will be partic- 
ular, and do no injury to the property of any true Prot- 
estant. I am well assured that the proprietor of this 
house is a stanch and worthy friend to the cause. 

“ George Gordon.” 

“ What’s this ! ” said the locksmith, with an altered 
face. 

“ Something that’ll do you good service, young feller,” 
replied his journeyman, “ as you’ll find. Keep that safe, 
and where you can lay your hand upon it in an instant. 
And chalk ‘ No Popery ’ on your door to-morrow night, 
and for a week to come — that’s all.” 

“ This is a genuine document,” said the locksmith, “ I 
know, for I have seen the hand before. What threat 
does it imply ? What devil is abroad ? ” 

“ A fiery devil,” retorted Sim ; “ a flaming furious 
devil. Don’t you put yourself in its way, or you’re done 
for, my buck. Be warned in time, G. Varden. Fare- 
well ! ” 

But here the two women threw themselves in his way 
— especially Miss Miggs, who fell upon him with such 
'ervor that she pinned him against the wall — and con- 
jured him in moving words not to go forth till he was 


266 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


sober ; to listen to reason ; to think of it ; to take some 
rest, and then determine. 

“ I tell you,” said Mr. Tappertit, “ that my mind is 
made up. My bleeding country calls me and I go ! 
Miggs, if you don’t get out of the way, I’ll pinch you.” 

Miss Miggs, still clinging to the rebel, screamed once 
vociferously — but whether in the distraction of her 
mind, or because of his having executed his threat, is 
uncertain. 

" Release me,” said Simon, struggling to free himself 
from her chaste, but spider-like embrace. “ Let me go ! 
I have made armogements for you in an altered state of 
society, and mean to provide for you comfortably in life 
— there ! Will that satisfy you ? ” 

“ Oh Simmun ! ” cried Miss Miggs. “ Oh my blessed 
Simmun ! Oh mim ! what are my feelings at this con- 
flicting moment ! ” 

Of a rather turbulent description, it would seem ; for 
her nightcap had been knocked off in the scuffle, and she 
was on her knees upon the floor, making a strange reve- 
lation of blue and yellow curl-papers, straggling locks of 
hair, tags of staylaces, and strings of it’s impossible to 
say what ; panting for breath, clasping her hands, turn- 
ing her eyes upwards, shedding abundance of tears, and 
exhibiting various other symptoms of the acutest mental 
suffering. 

“ I leave,” said Simon, turning to his master, with an 
utter disregard of Miggs’s maidenly affliction, “ a box of 
things up-stairs. Do what you like with ’em. I don’t 
want ’em. I’m never coming back here, any more. 
Provide yourself, sir, with a journeyman ; I’m my coun- 
try’s journeyman ; henceforward that’s my line of busi- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


267 


“ Be what you like in two hours’ time, but now go up 
to bed,” retunied the locksmith, planting himself in the 
door-way. “ Do you hear me ? Go to bed ! ” 

“ I hear you, and defy you, Varden,” rejoined Simon 
Tappertit. “ This night, sir, I have been in the country, 
planning an expedition which shall fill your bell-hanging 
soul with wonder and dismay. The plot demands my 
utmost energy. Let me pass ! ” 

“ I’ll knock you down if you come near the door,” 
replied the locksmith. “ You had better go to bed ! ” 

Simon made no answer, but gathering himself up as 
straight as he could, plunged head foremost at his old 
master, and the two went driving out into the workshop 
together, plying their hands and feet so briskly that they 
looked like half a dozen, while Miggs and Mrs. Varden 
screamed for twelve. 

It would have been easy for Varden to knock his old 
’prentice down, and bind him hand and foot ; but as he- 
was loath to hurt him in his then defenceless state, he 
contented himself with parrying his blows when he could, 
taking them in perfect good part when he could not, and 
keeping between him and the door, until a favorable op- 
portunity should present itself for forcing him to retreat 
up-stairs, and shutting him up in his own room. But, in 
the goodness of his heart, he calculated too much upon his 
adversary’s weakness, and forgot that drunken men who 
have lost the power of walking steadily, can often run. 
Watching his time, Simon Tappertit made a cunning 
show of falling back, staggered unexpectedly forward, 
brushed past him, opened the door (he knew the trick of 
that lock well), and darted down the street like a mad 
dog. The locksmith paused for a moment in the excess 
of his astonishment, and then gave chase. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


2t)8 

It was an excellent season for a run, for at that silent 
hour the streets were deserted, the air was cool, and the 
flying figure before him distinctly visible at a great dis- 
tance, as it sped away, with a long gaunt shadow follow- 
ing at its heels. But the short-winded locksmith had 
no chance against a man of Sim’s youth and spare 
figure, though the day had been when he could have 
run him down in no time. The space between them 
rapidly increased, and as the rays of the rising sun 
streamed upon Simon in the act of turning a distant 
corner, Gabriel Varden was fain to give up, and sit down 
on a door-step to fetch his breath. Simon meanwhile, 
without once stopping, fled at the same degree of swift- 
ness to The Boot, where, as he well knew, some of his 
company were lying, and at which respectable hostelry 
— for he had already acquired the distinction of being 
in great peril of the law — a friendly watch had been 
expecting him all night, and was even now on the look- 
out for his coming. 

“ Go thy ways, Sim, go thy ways,” said the locksmith, 
as soon as he could speak. “ I have done my best for 
thee, poor lad, and would have saved thee, but the rope 
is round thy neck, I fear.” 

So saying, and shaking his head in a very sorrowful 
and disconsolate manner, he turned back, and soon re- 
entered his own house, where Mrs. Varden and the 
faithful Miggs had been anxiously expecting his return. 

Now Mrs. Varden (and by consequence Miss Miggs 
likewise) was impressed with a secret misgiving that she 
had done wrong ; that she had to the utmost of her small 
means, aided and abetted the growth of disturbances, the 
end of which it was impossible to foresee ; that she had 
led remotely to the scene which had just passed ; and 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


269 


that tlye locksmith’s time for triumph and reproach had 
now arrived indeed. And so strongly did Mrs. Varden 
feel this, and so crestfallen was she in consequence^ that 
while her husband was pursuing their lost journeyman, 
she secreted under her chair the little red-brick dwell- 
ing-house with the yellow roof, lest it should furnish 
new occasion for reference to the painful theme ; and 
now hid the same still more, with the skirts of her 
dress. 

But it happened that the locksmith had been thinking 
of this very article on his way home, and that, coming 
into the room and not seeing it, he at* once demanded 
where it was. 

Mrs. Varden had no resource but to produce it, which 
she did with many tears, and broken protestations that 
if she could have known — 

“ Yes, yes,” said Varden, “ of course — I know that. 
I don’t mean to reproach you, my dear. But recollect 
from this time that all good things perverted to evil 
purposes, are worse than those which are naturally bad. 
A thoroughly wicked woman, is wicked indeed. When 
religion goes wrong, she is very wrong, for the same 
reason. Let us say no more about it, my dear.” 

So he dropped the red-brick dwelling-house on the 
floor, and setting his heel upon it, crushed it into pieces. 
The halfpence, and sixpences, and other voluntary con- 
tributions, rolled about in all directions, but nobody of- 
fered to touch them, or to take them up. 

“ That,” said the locksmith, “ is easily disposed of, 
and I would to Heaven that everything growing out of 
the same society could be settled as easily.” 

^ It happens; very fortunately, Varden,” said his wife, 
ivith her handkerchief to her eyes, “ that in case any 


270 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


more disturbances should happen t — which I hope not ; 
I sincerely hope not ” — ' 

‘*1 hope so too, my dear.” 

— “ That in case any should occur, we have the 
piece of paper which that poor misguided young man 
brought.” 

“Ay, to be sure,” said the locksmith, turning quickly 
round. “ Where is that piece of paper ? ” 

Mrs. Varden stood aghast as he took it from her out- 
stretched hand, tore it into fragments, and threw them 
jnder the grate. 

“ Not use it ? ” she said. 

“ Use it ! ” cried the locksmith. “ No ! Let them 
come and pull the roof about our ears ; let them burn 
us out of house and home ; I’d neither have the pro- 
tection of their leader, nor chalk their howl upon my 
door, though, for not doing it, they shot me on my own 
threshold. Use it ! Let them come and do their worst. 
The first man who crosses my door-step on such an er- 
rand as theirs, had better be a hundred miles away. 
Let him look to it. The others may have their will. I 
wouldn’t beg or buy them off, if, instead of every pound 
of iron in the place, there was a hundred weight of gold. 
Get you to bed, Martha. I shall take down the shutters 
and go to work. 

“ So early ! ” said his wife. 

“ Ay,” replied the locksrfiith cheerily, “ so early. Come 
when they may, they shall not find us skulking and hid- 
ing, as if we feared to take our portion of the light of 
day, and left it all to them. So pleasant* dreams to you, 
my dear, and cheerful sleep ! ” 

With that he gave his wife a hearty kiss, and bade 
her delay no longer, or it would be time to rise before 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


271 


Bhe lay down to rest. Mrs. Varden quite amiably and 
meekly walked up-stairs, followed by Miggs, who, al- 
though a good deal subdued, could not refrain from 
sundry stimulative coughs and sniffs by the way, or 
from holding up her hands in astonishment at the dar- 
ing conduct of master. 


272 


BAR^JABY RUDGE. 


CHAPTER LH. 

A MOB is usually a creature of very mysterious ex- 
istence, particularly in a large city. Where it comes 
from or whither it goes, few men can tell. Assembling 
and dispersing with equal suddenness, it is as difficult to 
follow to its various sources as the sea itself ; nor does 
the parallel stop here, for the ocean is not more fickle 
and uncertain, more terrible when roused, more unrea- 
sonable, or more cruel. 

The people who were boisterous at Westminster upon 
the Friday morning, and were eagerly bent upon the 
work of devastation in Duke Street and Warwick Street 
at night, were, in the mass, the same. ^Allowing for the 
chance accessions of which any crowd is morally sure in 
a town where there must always be a large number of 
idle and profligate persons, one and the same mob was 
at both places. Yet they spread themselves in various 
directions when they dispersed in the .afternoon, made no 
appointment for reassembling, had no definite purpose or 
design, and indeed, for anything they knew, were scat- 
tered beyond the hope of future union. 

At The Boot, which, as has been shown, was in a 
manner the head-quarters of the rioters, there were not, 
upon this Friday night, a dozen people. Some slept in 
ihe stable and out-houses, some in the common room, 
some two or three in beds. The rest were *in their usual 
homes or haunts. Perhaps not a score in all lay in the 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


273 


adjacent fields and lanes, and under haystacks, or near 
the warmth of brick-kilns, who had not their accustomed 
place of rest beneath the open sky. As to the public 
ways within the town, they had their ordinary nightly 
occupants, and no others ; the usual amount of vice and 
wretchedness, but no more. 

The experience of one evening, however, had taught 
the reckless leaders of disturbance, that they had but to 
show themselves in the streets, to be immediately sur- 
rounded by materials which they could only have kept 
together when their aid was not required, at great risk, 
expense, and trouble. Once possessed of this secret, 
they were as confident as if twenty thousand men, de- 
voted to their will, had been encamped about them, and 
assumed a confidence which could not have been sur- 
passed, though that had really been the case. All day, 
Saturday, they remained quiet. On Sunday they rather 
studied how to keep their men within call, and in full 
hope, than to follow out, by any very fierce measure, 
their first day’s proceedings. 

‘‘ I hope,” said Dennis, as, with a loud yawn, he raised 
his body from a heap of straw on which he had been 
sleeping, and supporting his head upon his hand, ap- 
pealed to Hugh on Sunday morning, that Muster 
Gashford allows some rest? Perhaps he’d have us at 
work again already, eh ? ” 

“ It’s not his way to let matters drop, you may be sure 
of that,” growled Hugh in answer. “ I’m in no humor 
to stir yet, though. I’m as stiff as a dead body, and as 
full of ugly scratches as if I had been fighting all day 
yesterday with wild cats.” 

“ You’ve so much enthusiasm, that’s it,” said Dennis, 
looking with ffreat admiration at the uncombed head, 

VOL. V 18 


274 


BARNABY RUDGE, 


matted beard, and torn hands and face of the wild figure 
before him ; “ you’re such a devil of a fellow. You hurt 
yourself a hundred times more than you need, because 
you will be foremost in everything, and will do more 
than the rest.” 

“ For the matter of that,” returned Hugh, shaking 
back his ragged hair and glancing towards the door of 
the stable in which they lay ; “ there’s one yonder as 
good as me. What did I tell you about him? Did 1 
say he was worth a dozen, when you doubted him?” 

Mr. Dennis rolled lazily over upon his breast, and 
resting his chin upon his hand in imitation of the atti- 
tude in which Hugh lay, said, as he, too, looked towards 
the door : — 

“Ay, ay, you knew him brother, you knew him. But 
who’d suppose to look at that chap now, that he could be 
the man he is ! Isn’t it a thousand cruel pities, brother, 
that instead of taking his nat’ral rest and qualifying him- 
self for further exertions in this here honorable cause, 
he should be playing at soldiers like a boy ? And his 
cleanliness too ! ”■ said Mr. Dennis, who certainly had no 
reason to entertain a fellow-feeling with anybody who 
was particular on that score ; “ what weaknesses he’s 
guilty of, with respect to his cleanliness ! At five o’clock 
this morning, there he was at the pump, though any one 
would think he had gone through enough, the day before 
yesterday, to be pretty fast asleep at that time. But no 

— when I woke for a minute or two, there he was at the 
pump, and if you’d have seen him sticking them pea- 
cock’s feathers into his hat when he’d done washing 

— ah ! I’m sorry he’s such a imperfect character, but 
the best on us is incomplete in some pint of view or 
another.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


275 


The subject of this dialogue and of these concluding 
remarks, which were uttered in a tone of philosophical 
meditation, was, as the reader will have divined, no other 
than Barnaby, who, with his flag in his hand, stood 
sentry in the little patch of sunlight at the distant door, 
or walked to and fro outside, singing softly to himself 
and keeping time to the music of some clear church 
bells. Whether he stood still, leaning with both hands 
on the flagstaff, or, bearing it upon his shoulder, paced 
slowly up and down, the careful arrangement of his poor 
dress, and his erect and lofty bearing, showed how high 
a sense he had of the great importance of his trust, and 
how happy and how proud it made him. To Hugh and 
his companion, who lay in a dark corner of the gloomy 
shed, he, and the sunlight, and the peaceful Sabbath 
sound to which he made response, seemed like *a bright 
picture framed by the door, and set off by the stable’s 
blackness. The whole formed such a contrast to them- 
selves, as they lay wallowing, like some obscene animals, 
in their squalor and wickedness on the two heaps of 
straw, that for a few moments they looked on without 
speaking, and felt almost ashamed. 

‘‘ Ah ! ” said Hugh at length, carrying it off with a 
laugh : “ He’s a rare fellow is Barnaby, and can do 
more, with less rest, or meat, or drink, than any of 
us. As to his soldiering, I put him on duty there.” 

Then there was a object in it, and a proper good 
one too, I’ll be sworn,” retorted Dennis with a broad 
grin, and an oath of the same quality. “ What was 
it, brother ? ” 

“Why, you see,” said Hugh, crawling a little nearer 
to him, “ that our noble captain yonder, came in yester- 
day moi-ning rather the worse 'for liquor, and was — lliie 
you and me — ditto last night.” 


276 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Dennis looked to where Simon Tappertit lay coiled 
upon a truss of hay, snoring profoundly, and nodded. 

“ And our noble captain,” continued Hugh with an- 
other laugh, “ our noble captain and I, have planned 
for to-morrow a roaring expedition, with good profit 
in it.” 

“ Again, the papists ? ” asked Dennis, rubbing his 
hands. 

“ Ay, against the> papists — against one of ’em at least, 
that some of us, and I for one, owe a good heavy grudge 
to.” 

“ Not Muster Gashford’s friend that he spoke to us 
about in my house, eh ? ” said Dennis, brimful of 
pleasant expectation. 

“The same man,” said Hugh. 

“ That’s your sort,” cried Mr. Dennis, gayly shaking 
hands with him, “ that’s the kind of game. Let’s have 
revenges and injuries, and all that, and we shall get on 
twice as fast. Now you talk, indeed ! ” 

“ Ha, ha, ha ! The captain,” added Hugh, “ has 
thoughts of carrying off a woman in the bustle, and 
-s— ha, ha, ha ! — and so have I ! ” 

Mr. Dennis received this part of the scheme with a 
wry face, observing that as a general principle he ob- 
jected to women altogether, as being unsafe and slippery 
persons, on whom there was no calculating with any 
certainty, and who were never in the same mind for 
four-and-twenty hours at a stretch. He might have 
expatiated on this suggestive theme at much greater 
length, but that it occurred to him to ask what connec- 
tion existed between the proposed expedition and Bar- 
naby’s being posted at the stable-door as sentry ; to 
which Hugh cautiously replied in these words ; — 


RAIJXAI’.Y RUIH’ri:. 


277 


“ Why, the people we mean to visit, were friends of 
his, once upon a time, and I know that much of him to 
feel pretty sure that if he thought we were going to do 
them any harm, he’d be no friend to our side, but would 
lend a ready hand to the other. So I’ve persuaded him 
(for I know hiiik of old) that Lord George has picked 
him out to guard this place to-morrow while we’re away, 
and that it’s a great honor — and so he’s on duty now, 
and as proud of it as if he was a general. . Ha, ha ! 
What do you say to me for a careful man as well as 
a devil of a one ? ” 

Mr. Dennis exhausted himself in compliments, and 
then added : — 

“ But about the expedition itself” — 

“About that,” said Hugh, “you shall hear all particu- 
lars from me and the great captain conjointly and both 
together — for see, he’s waking up. Rouse yourself lion- 
heart. Ha, ha ! Put a good face upon it, and drink 
again. Another hair of the dog that bit you, captain ! 
Cali for drink ! There’s enough of gold and silver cups 
and candlesticks buried underneath my bed,” he added, 
rolling back the straw, and pointing to where the ground 
was newly turned, “ to pay for it, if it was a score of 
casks full. Drink captain ! ” 

Mr. Tappertit received these jovial promptings with a 
very bad grace, being much the worse, both in mind and 
body, for his two nights of debauch, and but indifferently 
able to stand upon his legs. With Hugh’s assistance, 
however, he contrived to stagger to the pump ; and hav- 
ing refreshed himself with an abundant draught of cold 
water, and a copious shower of the same refreshing liquid 
on his head and face, he ordered some rum and milk to 
be served ; and upon that innocent beverage and some 


278 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


biscuits and cheese made a pretty hearty meal. That 
done, he disposed himself in an easy attitude on the 
ground beside his two companions (who were carousing 
after their own tastes), and proceeded to* enlighten Mr. 
Dennis in reference to to-morrow’s project. 

That their conversation was an interesting one, was 
rendered manifest by its length, and by the close atten- 
tion of all three. That it was not of an oppressively 
grave character, but was enlivened by various pleasan- 
tries arising out of the subject, was clear from their loud 
and frequent roars of laughter, which startled Barnaby 
on his post, and made him wonder at their levity. But 
he was not summoned to join them, until they had eaten, 
and drunk, and slept, and talked together for some 
hours ; not, indeed, until the twilight ; when they in- 
formed him that they were about to make a slight 
demonstration in the streets — just to keep the people’s 
hands in, as it was Sunday night, and the public might 
otherwise be disappointed — and that he was free to ac- 
company them if he would. 

Without the slightest preparation, saving that they 
carried clubs and w^ore the blue cockade, they sallied out 
into the streets ; and, with no more settled design than 
that of doing as much mischief as they could, paraded 
them at random. Their numbers rapidly increasing, 
they soon divided into parties ; and agreeing to meet 
by and by, in the fields near Welbeck-street, scoured 
the town in various directions. The largest body, and 
that which augmented with the greatest rapidity, was 
the one to which Hugh and Barnaby belonged. This 
took its w'ay towards Moorfields, where there was a 
rich chapel, and in which neighborhood several Catholic 
families were known to reside. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


279 


Beginning with the private houses so occupied, they 
»roke open the doors and windows ; and while they de- 
stroyed the furniture and left but the bare walls, made 
a sharp search for tools and engines of destruction, such 
as hammers, pokers, axes, saws, and such like instru- 
ments. Many of the rioters made belts of cord, of 
handkerchiefs, or any material they found at hand, and 
wore these weapons as openly as pioneers upon a field- 
day. There was not the least disguise or concealment 
— indeed, on this night, very little excitement or hurry. 
From the chapels, they tore down and took away the 
very altars, benches, pulpits, pews, and flooring ; from 
the dwelling-houses, the very w^ainscoting and stairs. 
This Sunday evening’s recreation they pursued like mere 
workmen who had a certain task to do, and did it. Fifty 
resolute men might have turned them at any moment ; a 
single company of soldiers could have scattered them 
like dust ; but no man interposed, no authority restrained 
them,, and, except by the terrified persons who fled from 
their approach, they were as little heeded as if they were 
pursuing their lawful occupation* with the utmost sobriety 
and good conduct. 

In the same manner, they marched to the place of 
rendezvous agreed upon, made great fires in the fields, 
and reserving the most valuable of their spoils, burnt 
the rest. Priestly garments, images of saints, rich stuffs 
and ornaments, altar-furniture and household goods, were 
cast into the flames, and shed a glare on the whole coun- 
try round ; but they danced, and howled, and roared 
about these fires till they were tired, and were never for 
an instant checked. 

As the main body filed off from this scene of action, 
and passed down Welbeck Street they came upon Gash- 


280 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


ford, who had been a witness of their proceedings, and 
was walking stealthily along the pavement. Keeping 
up with him, and yet not seeming to speak, Hugh mut 
tered in his ear : — 

“ Is this better, master ? ” 

“ No,” said Gashford. “ It is not.” 

“ What would you have ? ” said Hugh. “ Fevers are 
never at their height at once. They must get on by 
degrees.” 

“ I would have you,” said Gashford, pinching his 
arm with such malevolence that his nails seemed to 
meet in the skin ; “ I would have you put some mean- 
ing into your work. Fools ! Can you make no better 
bonfires than of rags and scraps ? Can you burn noth- 
ing whole ? ” 

“ A little patience, master,” said Hugh. “ Wait but 
a few hours, and you shall see. Look for a redness in 
the sky, to-morrow night.” 

With that, he fell back into his place beside Barnaby ; 
and when the secretary looked after him, both were lost 
in the crowd. % 


BAKNABY BUDGE. 


281 




CHAPTER LlII. 

The next day was ushered in by merry peals of bells, 
and by the firing of the Tower guns ; flags were hoisted 
on many of the church-steeples ; the usual demonstra- 
tions were made, in honor of the anniversary of the 
King’s birthday ; and every man went about his pleas- 
ure or business, as if the city were in perfect order, and 
there were no half-smouldering embers in its secret 
places which on the approach of night would kindle up 
again, and scatter ruin and dismay abroad. The lead- 
ers of the riot, rendered still more daring by the success 
of last night and by the booty they had acquired, kept 
steadily together, and only thought of implicating the 
mass of their followers so deeply that no hope of pardon 
or reward might tempt them to sbetray their more notori- 
ous confederates into the hands of justice. 

Indeed, the sense of having gone too far to be for- 
given, held the timid together no less than the bold. 
Many, who would readily have pointed out the foremost 
rioters and given evidence against them, felt that escape 
by that means was hopeless, when their every act had 
been observed by scores of people who had taken no 
part in the disturbances ; who had suffered in their per- 
sons, peace, or property, by the outrages of the mob ; 
who would be most willing witnesses ; and whom the 
government would, no doubt, prefer to any King’s evi- 
‘ dence that might be offered. Many of this class had 


282 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


deserted their usual occupations on the Saturday mom* 
Ing ; some, had been seen by their employers, active in 
the tumult ; others, knew they must be suspected, and 
that they would be discharged if they returned ; others, 
had been desperate from the beginning, and comforted 
themselves with the homely proverb, that, being hanged 
at all, they might as well be hanged for a sheep as a 
lamb. They all hoped and believed, in a greater or 
less degree, that the government they seemed to have 
paralyzed, would, in its terror, come to terms with them 
in the end, and suffer them to make their own conditions. 
The least sanguine among them reasoned with himself 
that, at the worst, they were too many to be all punished, 
and that he had as good a chance of escape as any other 
man. The great mass never reasoned or thought at all, 
but were stimulated by their own headlong passions, by 
poverty, by ignorance, by the love of mischief, and the 
hope of plunder. 

One other circumstance is worthy of remark ; and 
that is, that from the moment of their first outbreak at 
Westminster, every symptom of order or preconcerted 
arrangement among them, vanished. When they divided 
into parties and ran to different quarters of the town, it 
was on the spontaneous suggestion of the moment. Each 
party swelled as it went along, like rivers as they roll 
towards the sea ; new leaders sprang up as they were 
wanted, disappeared when the necessity was over, and 
reappeared at the next crisis. Each tumult took shape 
■ and form, from the circumstances of the moment ; sober 
workmen going home from their day’s labor, were seen 
to cast down their baskets of tools and become rioters 
in an instant; mere boys on errands did the like. In 
a word, a moral plague ran through the city. The 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


283 


noise, and huiry, and excitement, had for hundreds and 
hundreds an attraction they had no firmness to resist. 
The contagion spread, like a dread fever : an infec- 
tious madness, as yet not near its height, seized on 
new victims every hour, and society began to tremble 
at their ravings. 

It was between two and three o’clock in the afternoon 
when Gashford looked into the lair described in the last 
chapter, and seeing only Barnaby and Dennis there, in- 
quired for Hugh. 

He was out, Barnaby told him ; had gone out more 
than an hour ago ; and had not yet returned. 

“ Dennis I ” said the smiling secretary, in his smooth- 
est voice, as he sat down cross-legged on a barrel, 
“ Dennis ! ” 

The hangman struggled into a sitting posture directly^ 
and with his eyes wide open, looked towards him. 

“ How do you do, Dennis ? ” said Gashford, nodding. 
“ I hope you have sufifered no inconvenience from your 
late exertions, Dennis ? ” 

“ I always will say of you. Muster Gashford,” re- 
turned the hangman, staring at him, “ that that ’ere 
quiet way of yours might almost wake a dead man. It 
is,” he added with a muttered oath — still staring at him 
in a thoughtful manner — “ so awful sly ! ” 

“ So distinct, eh Dennis ? ” 

“ Distinct ! ” he answered, scratching his head, and 
keeping his eyes upon the secretary’s face ; “ I seem 
to hear it. Muster Gashford, in my wery bones.” 

“ I am very glad your sense of hearing is so sharp, 
and that I succeed in making myself so intelligible,” 
said Gashford, in his unvarying, even tone. “ Where is 
your friend ? ” 


284 


BARNABY RUDGE, 


Mr. Derinis looked round as in expectation of behold- 
ing him asleep upon his bed of straw ; then remem- 
bering that he had seen him go out, replied : — 

“ I can’t say where he is, Muster Gashford, I ex- 
pected him back afore now. I hope it isn’t time that 
we was busy. Muster Gashford ? ” 

“ Nay,” said the secretary, “ who should know that 
as well as you ? How can 1 tell you, Dennis ? You 
are perfect master of your own actions, you know, and 
accountable to nobody — except sometimes to the law, 
eh ? ” 

Dennis, who was very much baffled by the cool mat- 
ter-of-course manner of this reply, recovered his self- 
possession on his professional pursuits being referred 
to, and pointing towards Barnaby, shook his head and 
frowned. 

“ Hush ! ” cried Barnaby. 

“ Ah ! Do hush about that, Muster Gashford,” said 
the .hangman in a low voice, “pop’lar prejudices — 
you. always forget — well, Barnaby, my lad, what’s the 
matter ” 

“ I hear him coming,” he answered : “ Hark ! Do 

you mark that ? That’s his foot ! Bless you, I know 
his step, and his dog’s too. Tramp, tramp, pit-pat, on 
they come together, and, ha, ha, ha ! — and here they 
are ! ” he cried joyfully, welcoming Hugh with both 
hands, and then patting him fondly on the back, as if 
instead of being the rough companion he was, he had 
been one of the most prepossessing of men. “ Here he 
is, and safe too ! I am glad to see him back again, 
old Hugh!” 

“ I’m a Turk if he don’t give me a warmer wel- 
come always than any man of sense,” said Hugh, 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


285 


shaking hands with him with a kind of ferocious friend- 
ship, strange enough to see. “ How are you, boy ? ” 

“Hearty!” cried Barnaby, waving his’ hat. “Ha, 
ha, ha ! And merry too, Hugh ! And ready to do any- 
thing for the good cause, and the right, and to help the 
kind, mild, pale-faced gentleman — the lord they used so 
ill — eh, Hugh?” 

“ Ay I ” returned his friend, dropping his hand, and 
looking at Gashford for an instant with a changed ex- 
pression before he spoke to him. “ Good-day, master I ” 

“ And good-day to you,” replied the secretary, nurs- 
ing his leg. “ And many good days — whole years of 
them, I hope. • You are heated.” 

“ So would you have been, master,” said Hugh, wip- 
ing his face, “ if you’d been running here as fast as I 
have.” 

“ You know the news then ? Yes, I supposed you 
would have heard it.” 

“ News I what news ! ” 

“ You don’t ? ” cried Gashford, raising his eyebrows 
with an exclamation of surprise. “ Dear me ! Come ; 
then I am the first to make you acquainted with your 
distinguished position after all. Do you see the King’s 
Arms a-top ? ” he smilingly asked, as he took a large 
paper from his pocket, unfolded it, and held it out for 
Hugh’s inspection. 

“ Well ! ” said Hugh. “ What’s that to me ? ” 

“Much. A great deal,” replied the secretary. “Read 
it.” 

“I told you, the first time I saw you, that I couldn’t 
read,” said Hugh, impatiently. “ What in the Devil’s 
name’s inside of it ? ” 

“It is a proclamation from the King in Council.” 


286 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


Baid Gashlbrd, “ dated to-day, and offering a reward 
of five hundred pounds — five hundred pounds is a 
great deal of money, and a large temptation to some 
people — to any one who will discover the person 
or persons most active in demolishing those chapels on 
Saturday night.” 

“ Is that all ? ” cried Hugh, with an indifferent air. 
“ I knew of that.” 

“ Truly I might have known you did,” said Gashford, 
smiling and folding up the document again. “ Your 
friend, I might have guessed — indeed I did guess — 
was sure to tell you.” 

“ My friend ! ” stammered Hugh, with- an unsuccess- 
ful effort to appear surprised. “ What friend ? ” 

“ Tut tut — do you suppose I don’t know where you 
have been ? ” retorted Gashford, rubbing his hands, and 
beating the back of one on the palm of the other, and 
looking at him with a cunning eye. “ How dull you 
think me ! Shall I say his name ? ” 

“ No,” said Hugh, with a hasty glance tow'ards Dennis. 

“ You have also heard from him, no doubt,” resumed 
the secretary, after a moment’s pause, “ that the rioters 
who have been taken (poor fellows) are committed for 
trial, and that some very active witnesses have had the 
temerity to appear against them. Among others ” — and 
here he clinched his teeth, as if he would suppress, by 
force, some violent w'ords that rose upon his tongue ; and 
spoke very slowly. “ Among others, a gentleman who 
saw the work going on in Warwick Street ; a Catholic 
gentleman ; one Haredale.” 

Hugh would have prevented his uttering the word, 
but it was out already. Hearing the name, Bamaby 
turned swiftly round. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


287 


“ Duty, duty, bold Barnaby ! ” cried Hugh, assuming 
his wildest and most rapid 'manner, and thrusting into 
his hand his staff and flag which leant against the wall. 
“ Mount guard without loss of time, for we are off upon 
our expedition. Up, Dennis, and get ready ! Take 
care that no one turns the straw upon my bed, brave 
Barnaby ; we know what’s underneath it — eh ? Now, 
master, quick ! What you have to say, say speedily, for 
the little captain and a cluster of ’em are in the fields, 
and only waiting for us. Sharp’s the word, and strike’s 
the action. Quick ! ” 

Barnaby was not proof against this bustle and de 
spatch. The look of mingled astonishment and anger 
S' which had appeared in his face w'hen he turned towards 
them, faded from it as the words passed from his mem- 
ory, like breath from a polished mirror ; and grasping 
the weapon which Hugh forced upon him, he proucfly 
' took his station at the door, beyond their hearing. 

“ You might have spoiled our plans, master,” said 
Hugh. “Tom, too, of all men!” 

1 “ Who would have supposed that he would be so 
quick ? ” urged Gashford. 

Ij “ He’s as quick sometimes — I don’t mean with his 
i hands, for that you know, but with his head — as you, 
or any man,” said Hugh. “ Dennis, it’s time we were 
going ; they’re waiting for us ; I came to tell you. 
Reach me my stick and belt. Here I Lend a hand, 
master. Fling this over my shoulder, and buckle it 
behind, will you ? ” 

“ Brisk as ever ! ” said th§ secretary, adjusting it for 
him as he desired. 

“ A man need be brisk to-day ; there’s brisk work 
i ftfoot.” 


288 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ There is, is there ? ” said Gashford. He said it with 
such a provoking assumption of ignorance, that Hugh, 
looking over his shoulder and angrily down upon him, 
replied : — 

“ Is there ! You know there is ! Who knows bet- 
ter than you, master, that the first great step to be taken 
is to make examples of these witnesses, and frighten 
all men from appearing against us or any of our body, 
any more?” 

“ There’s one we know of,” returned Gashford, with' 
an expressive smile, “ who is at least as well informed 
upon that subject as you or I.” 

“ If we mean the same gentleman, as I suppose we 
do,” Hugh rejoined, softly, “ I tell you this — he’s as 
good and quick information about everything as” — here 
he paused and looked round, as if to make quite sure 
that the person in question was not within hearing — 
“ as Old Nick himself. Have you done that, master ? 
How slow you are ! ” 

“ It’s quite fast now,” said Gashford, rising. “ I say 
— you didn’t find that your friend disapproved of to- 
day’s little expedition ? Ha, ha, ha ! It is fortunate 
it jumps so well with the witness’ policy ; for once 
planned, it must have been carried out. And now you 
are going, eh ? ” • 

“Now we are going, master!” Hugh replied. “Any 
parting words ? ” 

“ Oh dear, no,” said Gashford sweetly. “ None I ” 

“ You’re sure ? ” cried Hugh, nudging the grinning 
Dennis. 

“ Quite sure, eh. Muster Gashford ? ” chuckled the 
hangman. 

Gashford paused a moment, struggling with his cau- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


289 


tion and his malice ; then putting himself between the 
two men, and laying a hand upon the arm of each, said, 
in a cramped whisper: — 

“ Do not, my good friends — I am sure you will not 
— forget our talk one night — in your house, Dennis — 
about this person. No mercy, no quarter, no two beams 
of his house to be left standing where the builder placed 
them ! Fire, the saying goes, is a good servant, but a 
bad master. Make it his master ; he deserves no bet- 
ter. But I am sure you will be firm, I am sure you 
will be very resolute, I am sure you will remember 
that he thirsts for your lives, and those of all your 
brave companions. If you ever acted like stanch fel- 
-ows, you will do so to-day. Won’t you Dennis, — won’t 
you, Hugh?” 

The two looked at him, and at each other ; then burst- 
ing into a roar of laughter, brandished their staves above 
their heads, shook hands, and hurried out. 

‘When they had been gone a little time, Gashford fol- 
lowed. They were yet in sight, and hastened to that 
part of the adjacent fields in which their fellows had al- 
ready mustered ; Hugh was looking back, and flourishing 
his hat to Barnaby, who, delighted with his trust, replied 
in the same manner, and then resumed his pacing up 
and down before the stable-door, where his feet had worn 
a path already. And when Gashford himself was fai 
distant, and looked back, for the last time, he was still 
walking to and fro, with the same measured tread ; the 
most devoted and the ‘blithest champion that ever main- 
tained a post, and felt his heart lifted up with a brave 
sense of duty, and determination to defend it to the last. 

Smiling at the simplicity of the poor idiot, Gashford 
betook himself to Welbeck Street by a different path 

VOL. II. 19 


290 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


from that which he knew the rioters would take, and 
sitting down behind a curtain in one of the upper 
windows of Lord George Gordon’s house, waited impa- 
tiently for their coming. They were so long, that al- 
though he knew it had been settled they should come 
that way, he had a misgiving they must have changed 
their plans and taken some other route. But at length 
the roar of voices was heard in the neighboring fields, 
and soon afterwards they came thronging past, in a great 
body. 

However, they were not all, nor nearly all, in one 
body, but were, as he soon found, divided into four par- 
ties, each of which stopped before the house to give 
three cheers, and then went on ; the leaders crying out 
in what direction they were going, and calling on the 
spectators to join them. The first detachment, carrying, 
by way of bannei-s, some relics of the havoc .they had 
made in Mporfields, proclaimed’ that they were on their 
way to Chelsea, whence they would return in the same 
order, to make of the spoil they bore, a great bonfire, 
near at 'hand. The second gave out that they were 
bound for Wapping, to destroy a chapel ; the third, that 
their place of destination was East Smithfield, and their 
object the. same. All this was done in broad, bright, 
summer day. Gay carriages and chairs stopped to let 
them pass, or turned back to avoid them ; people on 
foot stood aside in door- ways, or perhaps knocked and 
begged permission to stand at a window, or in the hall, 
until the rioters had passed : but Jiobody interfered with 
them ; and when they had gone by, everything went on 
as usual. 

There still remained the fourth body, and for that the 
secretary looked with a most intense eagerness At lasf 


BARNABir RUDGE. 


291 


it came up It was numerous, and composed of picked 
men ; for as he gazed down among them, he recognized 
many upturned faces . which he knew well ■ — those of 
Simon Tappertit, Hugh, and Dennis in the front, of 
course. They halted and cheered, as the others had 
done ; but when they moved again, they did not, like 
them, proclaim what design they had. Hugh merely 
riased his hat upon the bludgeon he carried, and glanc- 
ing at a spectator on the opposite side of the way, was 
gone, 

Gashford followed the direction of his glance instinc- 
tively, and saw, standing on the pavement, and -wearing 
the blue cockade, Sir John Chester. He held his hat 
an inch or two above his head, to propitiate the mob ; 
and resting gracefully on his cane, smiling pleasantly, 
and displaying hfs dress and person to the very best ad- 
vantage, looked on in the most tranquil state imaginable. 
For all that, and quick and dexterous as he was, Gash- 
fdrd had seen him recognize Hugh with the air of a 
patron. He had no longer any eyes for the crowd, but 
fixed his keen regards upon Sir John. 

He stood in the same place and posture, until the last 
man in the concourse had turned the corner of the street ; 
then very deliberately took the blue cockade out of his 
hat; put it carefully in his pocket, ready for the next 
emergency ; refreshed himself with a pinch of snuff ; put 
up his box ; and was walking slowly off, when a passing 
carriage stopped, and a lady’s hand let down the glass. 
Sir John’s hat was off again immediately. After a 
minute’s conversation at the carriage- window, in which 
it was apparent that he was vastly entertaining on the 
subject of the mob, he stepped lightly in, and was driven 
away. 


292 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


The secretary smiled, but he had other thoughts to 
dwell upon, and soon dismissed the topic. Dinner was 
brought him, but he sent it down untasted ; and, in rest- 
less pacings up and down the room, and constant glances 
at the clock, and many futile etforts to sit down and read, 
or go to sleep, or look out of the window, consumed four 
weary hours. When the dial told him thus much time 
had crept away, he stole up-stairs to the top of the house, 
and coming out upon the roof sat down, with his face 
towards the east. 

Heedless of the fresh air that blew upon his heated 
brow, of the pleasant meadows from which he turned, of 
the piles of roofs and chimneys upon which he looked, 
of the smoke and rising mist he vainly sought to pierce, 
of the shrill cries of children at their evening sports, the 
distant hum and turmoil of the town, the cheerful coun- 
try breath that rustled past to meet it, and to droop, and 
die ; he watched, and watched, till it was dark — save 
for the specks of light that twinkled in the streets below 
and far away — and, as the darkness deepened, strained 
his gaze and grew more eager yet 

“ Nothing but gloom in that direction, still ! ” he mut- 
tered restlessly. “ Dog ! where is the redness in the 
you promised me!” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


293 


, ‘ * CHAPTER LIV. 

Rumors of the prevailing disturbances had, by this 
time, begun to be pretty generally circulated through the 
towns and villages round London, and the tidings were 
everywhere received with that appetite for the marvel- 
lous and love of the terrible which have probably been 
among the natural characteristics of mankind since the 
creation of the world. These accounts, however, ap- 
peared, to many persons at that day — as they would to 
us at the present, but that we know them to be matter 
of history — so monstrous and improbable, that a great 
number of those who were resident at a distance, and 
who were credulous enough on other points, were really 
unable to bring their minds to believe that such things 
could be ; and rejected the intelligence they received on 
all hands, as wholly fabulous and absurd. 

Mr. Willet — not so much, perhaps, on account of his 
having argued and settled the matter with himself, as by 
j! reason of his constitutional obstinacy — was one of those 
who positively refused to entertain the current topic' 
1 for a moment. On this very evening, and perhaps at 
the very time when Gashford kept his solitary watch, 
old John was so red in the face with perpetually shaking 
his head in contradiction of his three ancient cronies and 
pot companions, that he was quite a phenomenon to be- 
hold, and lighted up the Maypole Porch wherein they 
sat together, like a monstrous carbuncle in a fairy talc. 


294 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ Do you think, sir,” said Mr. Willet, looking hard, at 
Solomon Daisy — for it was his custom in cases of per- 
sonal altercation to fasten upon the smallest man in the 
party — “ do you think sir, that I’m a born fool ? ” 

“No, no, Johnny,” returned Solomon, looking round 
upon the little circle of which he formed a part : “ We 
all know better than that. You’re no fool, Johnny. No, 
no ! ” 

Mr. Cobb and Mr. Parkes shook their heads in unison, 
muttering “No, no, Johnny, not you!” But as such 
compliments had usually the effect of making Mr. Willet 
rather more dogged than before, he surveyed them with 
a look of deep disdain, and returned for answer : — 

“ Then what do you mean by coming here, and telling 
me that this evening you’re a-going to walk up to Lon- 
don together — you three — you — and have the evi- 
dence of your own senses ? A’n’t,” said Mr. Willet, put- 
ting his pipe in his mouth with an air of solemn disgust, 
“ a’n’t the evidence of my senses enough for you ? ” 

“ But we haven’t got it, Johnny,” pleaded Parkes, 
humbly. 

“ You haven’t got it, sir ? ” repeated Mr. Willet, ey- 
ing him from top to toe. “ You haven’t got it, sir? You 
have got it, sir. Don’t I tell you that His blessed 
Majesty King George the Third would no more stand 
a rioting and rollicking in his streets, than he’d stand 
being crowed over by his own Parliament ? ” 

“Yes, Johnny, but that’s your sense — not your 
senses,” said the adventurous Mr. ' Parkes. 

“ How do you know,” retorted John with great dig- 
nity. “ You’re a-contradicting pretty free, you are, sir. 
How do you know which it is ? I’m not aware I ever 
*'old you, sir.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


a95 


Mr. Parkes, finding himself in the position of having 
got into metaphysics without exactly seeing his way out 
of them, stammered forth an apology and retreated from 
the argument. There then ensued a silence of some 
ten minutes or a quarter of an hour, at the expiration 
of which period Mr. Willet was observed to rumble and 
shake with laughter, and presently remarked, in refer- 
ence to his late adversary, “ that he hoped he had 
tackled him enough.” Thereupon Messrs. Cobb and 
Daisy laughed, and nodded, and Parkes was looked 
Upon as thoroughly and effectually put down. 

“ Do you suppose if all this was true, that Mr. Hare- 
dale would be constantly away from home, as he is ? ” 
said John, after another silence. “ Do you think ' he 
wouldn’t be afraid to leave his house with them two 
young women in it, and only a couple of men, or 
so ? ” 

“ Ay, but then you know,” returned Solomon Daisy, 
‘‘ his house is a goodish way out of London, and they do 
say that the rioters won’t go more than two mile, or 
three at farthest, off the stones. Besides, you know, 
some of the Catholic gentlefolks have actually sent 
trinkets and such-like down here for safety — at least, 
BO the story goes.” 

“ The story goes ! ” said Mr. Willet testily. “ Yes 
sir. The story goes that you saw a ghost last March. 
But nobody believes it.” 

“ Well ! ” said Solomon, rising, to divert the attention 
of his two friends, who tittered at* this retort : “ believed 
or disbelieved, it’s true ; and true or not, if we mean to 
go to London, we must be going at once. So shake 
hands, Johnny, and good-night.” 

“ I shall shake hands,” returned the landlord, putting 


296 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


his into his pockets, “ with no man as goes to London on 
Buch nonsensical errands.” « 

The three cronies were therefore reduced to the neces- 
sity of shaking his elbows ; having performed that cere- 
mony, and brought from the house their hats, and sticks, 
and great-coats, they bade him good-night and departed ; 
promising to bring him on the morrow full and true ac- 
counts of the real state of the city, and if it were quiet, 
to give him the full merit of his victory. 

John Willet looked after them, as they: plodded along 
the road in the rich glow of a summer evening; and 
knocking the ashes out of his pipe, laughed inw'ardly at 
their folly, until his sides were sore. When he had 
quite exhausted himself — which took some time, for he 
laughed as slowly as he thought and spoke — he sat 
himself comfortably with his back to the house, put his 
legs upon the bench, then his apron over his face, and 
fell sound asleep. 

How long he slept, matters not ; but it was for no 
brief space, for when he awoke, the rich light had faded, 
.the sombre hues of night were falling fast upon the land- 
scape, and a few bright stars were already twinkling 
overhead. The birds were all at roost, the daisies on 
the green had closed their fairy hoods, the honeysuckle 
twining round the porch exhaled its perfume in a two- 
fold degree, as though it lost its coyness at that silent 
time and loved to shed its fragrance on the night ; the 
ivy scarcely stirred its deep green leaves. How tran- 
quil, and how beautiful it was ! 

Was there no sound in the air, besides the gentle rus- 
tling of the trees and the grasshopper’s merry chirp ? 
Hark ! Something very faint and distant, not unlike 
the murmuring in a sea-shell. Now it grew louder. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


207 


fainter now, and now it altogether died away. Present* 
ly it came again, subsided, came once more, grew louder 
fainter — swelled into a roar. It was on the road, and 
varied with its windings. All at once it burst into a 
distinct sound — the voices, and the tramping feet of 
many men. 

It is questionable w'hether old John Willet, even then, 
would have thought of the rioters, but for the cries of 
his cook and house-maid, who ran screaming up-stairs 
and locked themselves into one of the old garrets, — 
shrieking dismally when they had done so, by way of 
rendering their place of refuge perfectly secret and se- 
cure. These two females did afterwards depone that 
Mr. Willet in his consternation uttered but one word, 
and called that up the stairs in a stentorian voice, six 
distinct times. But as this word was a monosyllable', 
which, however inoffensive when applied to the quad- 
ruped it denotes, is highly reprehensible when used in 
connection with females of unimpeachable character, 
many persons were inclined to believe that the young 
women labored under some hallucination caused by ex- 
cessive fear ; and that their ears deceived them. 

Be this as it may, John Willet, in whom the very ut- 
termost extent of dull-headed perplexity supplied the 
place of courage, stationed himself in the porch, and 
waited for their coming up. Once, it dimly occurred to 
him that there was a kind of door to the house, which 
lad a lock and bolts ; and at the same time some shad- 
owy ideas of shutters to the lower windows, flitted 
•hrough his brain. But he stood stock-still, looking down 
the road in the direction in which the noise was rapidly 
advancing, and did not so much as take his hands out of 
his pockets 


298 


BARNABY RUDGE, 


He had not to wait long. A dark mass, looming 
through a cloud of dust, soon became visible ; the mob 
quickened their pace ; shouting and whooping like sav- 
ages, they came rushing on pell-mell ; and in a few sec- 
onds he was bandied from hand to hand, in tlie heart of 
a crowd of men. 

“ Holloa ! ” cried a voice he knew, as the man who 
spoke came cleaving through the throng. “ Where is 
he ? Give him to me. Don’t hurt him. How now, 
old Jack ! Ha, ha, ha ! ” 

Mr. Willet looked at him, and saw it was Hugh ; but 
he said nothing, and thought nothing. 

“ These lads are thirsty and must drink ! ” cried Hugh, 
thrusting him back towards the house. “ Bustle, Jack, 
bustle. Show us the best — the very best — the over- 
proof that you keep for your own drinking. Jack ! ” 

John faintly articulated the words, “ Who’s to pay ? ” 

“ He says, ‘ Who’s to pay ! ’ ” cried Hugh, with a roar 
of laughter which was loudly echoed by the crowd. 
Then turning to John, he added, “ Pay ! Why, no- 
body.” 

John stared round at the mass of faces — some grin- 
ning, some fierce, some lighted up by torches, some in- 
iistinct, some dusky and shadowy : some looking at him, 
lome at his house, some at each other — and while he 
was, as he thought, in the very act of doing so, found 
himself, without any consciousness of having moved, in 
the bar ; sitting down in an arm-chair, and watching the 
destruction of his property, as if it were some queer 
play or entertainment, of an astonishing and stupefying 
nature, but having no reference to himself — that he 
could make out — at all. 

Yes. Here was the bar — the bar that the boldest 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


299 


never entered without special invitation — the sanctuary, 
the mystery, the hallowed ground : here it was, crammed 
with men, clubs, sticks, torches, pistols ; filled with 
a deafening noise, oaths, shouts, screams, hootings ; 
changed all at once into a bear-garden, a mad-house, an 
nfernal temple : men darting in and out, by door and 
window, smashing the glass, turning the taps, drinking 
liquor out of China punch-bowls, sitting astride of casks, 
smoking private and personal pipes, cutting down the 
sacred grove of lemons, hacking and hewing at the cele- 
brated cheese, breaking open inviolable drawers, putting 
things in their pockets which didn’t belong to them, di- 
viding his own money before his own eyes, wantonly 
wasting, breaking, pulling down and tearing up : nothing 
quiet, nothing private ; men everywhere — above, below, 
overhead, in the bedrooms, in the kitchen, in the yard, 
in the stables — clambering in at windows when there 
were doors wide open ; dropping out of windows when 
the stairs were handy; leaping over the banisters into 
chasms of passages : new faces and figures presenting 
themselves every instant — some yelling, some singing, 
some fighting, some breaking glass and crockery, some 
laying the dust with the liquor they couldn’t drink, some 
ringing the bells till they pulled them down, others beat- 
ing them with pokers till they beat them into fragments: 
more men still — more, more, more — swarming on like 
insects : noise, smoke, light, darkness, frolic, anger, 
laughter, groans, plunder, fear, and ruin ! 

* Nearly all the time while John looked on at this be- 
wildering scene, Hugh kept near him ; and though he 
was the loudest, wildest, most destructive villain there, 
he saved his old master’s bones a score of times. Nay, 
even when Mr Tappertit, excited by liquor, came up, 


300 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


and in assertion of his prerogative politely kicked John 
Willet on the shins, Hugh bade him return the compli- 
ment ; and if old John had had sufficient presence of 
mind lo understand this whispered direction, and to profit 
by it, he might no doubt, under Hugh’s protection, have 
done so w'ith impunity. 

At length the band began to reassemble outside the 
house, and to call to those within, to join them, for 
they were losing time. These murmurs increasing, and 
attaining a high pitch, Hugh, and some of those who yet 
lingered in the bar, and who plainly were the leaders of 
the troop, took counsel together, apart, as to what was to 
be done with John, to keep him quiet until their Chig- 
well work was over. Some proposed to set the house 
on fire and leave him in it; others, that he should be 
reduced to a state of temporary insensibility, by knock- 
ing on the head ; others, that he should be sworn to sit 
where he was until to-morrow at the same hour ; others 
again, that he should be gagged and taken off with them, 
under a sufficient guard. All these propositions being 
overruled, it was concluded, at last, to bind him in his 
chair, and the word was passed for Dennis. 

“ Look’ee here. Jack I ” said Hugh, striding up to him : 
“ We’re going to tie you, hand and foot, but otherwise 
you won’t be hurt. D’ye hear?” 

John Willet looked at another man, as if he didn’t 
know which was the speaker, and muttered something 
about an ordinary every Sunday at two o’clock. 

“ You won’t be hurt 1 tell you. Jack — do you hear 
me ? ” roared Hugh, impressing the assurance upon him 
by means of a heavy blow on the back. “ He’s so dead 
scared, he’s wool-gathering, I think. Give him a drop 
of something to drink here. Hand over, one of you.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


301 


A glass of liquor being passed forward, Hugh poured 
the contents down old John’s throat. Mr. Willet feebly 
smacked his lips, thrust his hand into his pocket, and 
inquired what w'as to pay ; adding, as he looked vacant- 
ly round, that he believed there was a trifle of broken 
glass — 

“ He’s out of his senses for the time, it’s my belief,** 
said Hugh, after shaking him, without any visible effect 
upon his system, until his keys rattled in his pocket 
“ Where’s that Dennis ? ” 

The word was again passed, and presently Mr. Dennis 
with a long cord bound about his middle, something after 
the manner of a friar, came hurrying in, attended by a 
body-guard of half a dozen of his men. 

“ Ck)me ! Be alive here ! ” cried Hugh, stamping his 
foot upon the ground. “ Make haste ! ” 

Dennis, with a wink and a nod, unwound the cord 
from about his person, and raising his eyes to the ceiling, 
looked all over it, and round the walls and cornice, with 
a curious eye ; then shook his head. 

“Move man, can’t you!” cried Hugh, with another 
impatient stamp of his foot. “ Are we to wait here, till 
the cry has gone for ten miles round, and our work’s in- 
terrupted ? ” 

“ It’s all very fine talking, brother,” answered Dennis, 
stepping towards him; “but unless” — and here he 
whispered in his ear — “ unless w’e do it ovei tlie door, 
it can’t be done at all in this here room.” 

“ What can’t ? ” Hugh demanded. 

“ What can’t I ” retorted Dennis. “ Why. the old 
man can’t.” 

“Why, you weren’t going to hang him I” cried 
Hugh. 


302 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“No, brother?” returned the hangman, with a stare. 
“What else?” 

Hugh made no answer, but snatching the rope from 
his companion’s hand, proceeded to bind old John him- 
self ; but his very first move was so bungling and 
unskilful, that Mr. Dennis entreated, almost with tears 
in his eyes, that he might be permitted to perform 
the duty. Hugh consenting, he achieved it in a twin- 
kling. 

“ There ! ” he said, looking mournfully at John Willet, 
who displayed no more emotion in his bonds than he had 
shown out of them. “ That’s what I call pretty, and 
workmanlike. He’s quite a picter now. But, brother, 
just a word with you — now that he’s ready trussed, as 
one may say, wouldn’t it be better for all parties if we 
was to work him off? It would read uncommon well in 
the newspapers, it would indeed. The public would 
think a great deal more on us ! ” 

Hugh, inferring what his companion meant, rather 
from his gestures than his technical mode of expressing 
himself (to which, as he was ignorant of his calling, he 
wanted the clew), rejected this proposition for the second 
time, and gave the word “ Forward ! ” which was echoed 
by a hundred voices from without. 

“ To the Warren ! ” shouted Dennis as he ran 
out, followed by the rest. “ A witness’s house, my 
lads ! ” 

A loud yell followed, and the whole throng hurried off, 
mad for pillage and destruction. Hugh lingered behind 
for a few moments to stimulate himself with more drink, 
and to set all the taps running, a few of which had acci- 
dentally been spared ; then, glancing round the despoiled 
and plundered room, through whose shattered window 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


S03 


the rioters had thrust the Maypole itself, — for even 
that had been sawn down, — lighted a torch, clapped 
the mute and motionless John Willet on the back, 
and waving his light above his head, and uttering a 
derce shout, hastened after his companions. f 


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BARNABY RUDGK. 


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■ i> 


CHAPTER LV. 

John Willet, left alone in his dismantled ba*, com 
iinued to sit staring about him ; awake as. to his eyes, 
certainly, but with all his powers of reason and reflection 
in a sound and dreamless sleep. He looked round upon 
the room which had been for years, and was within an 
hour ago, the pride of his heart ; and not a muscle of his 
face was moved. The night, without, looked black and 
cold through the dreary gaps in the casement ; the pre- 
cious liquids, now nearly leaked away, dripped with a 
hollow sound upon the floor; the Maypole peered rue- 
fully in through the broken window, like the bowsprit of 
a wrecked ship ; the ground might have been the bottom 
of the sea, it was so strewn with precious fragments.? 
Currents of air rushed in, as the old doors jarred and 
creaked upon their hinges ; the candles flickered andi 
guttered down, and made long winding-sheets ; the 
cheery deep-red curtains flapped and fluttered idly in 
the wind; even the stout Dutch kegs, overthrown and 
lying empty in dark corners, seemed the mere husks 
of good fellows whose jollity had departed, and who 
could kindle with a friendly glow no more. John saw 
this desolation, and yet saw it not. He was perfectly 
contented to sit there, staring at it, and felt no more 
indignation or discomfort in his bonds than if they had 
been robes of honor. So far as he was personally con- 
oerned, old Time lay snoring, and the world stood still. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


305 


Save for the dripping from the barrels, the rustling of 
such light fragments of destruction as the wind affected, 
and the dull creaking of the open doors, all w'as pro- 
foundly quiet : indeed, these sounds, like the ticking of 
the death-watch in the night, only made the silence they 
invaded deeper and more apparent. But quiet or noisy, 
it was all one to John. If a train of heavy artillery 
could have come up and commenced ball practice outside 
the window, it would have been all the same to him. 
He was a long way beyond surprise. A ghost couldn^t 
have overtaken him. 

By and by he heard a footstep — a hurried, and yet 
cautious footstep — coming on towards the house. It 
stopped, advanced again, then seemed to go quite round 
it. Having done that, it came beneath the window, and 
a head looked in. 

It was strongly relieved against the darkness outside 
by the glare of the guttering candles. A pale, worn, 
withered face; the eyes — but that was owing to its 
gaunt condition — unnaturally large and bright ; the 
hair, a grizzled black. It gave a searching glance all 
round the room, and a deep voice said : — 

“ Are you alone in this house ? ” 

John made no sign, though the question was repeated 
twice, and he heard it distinctly. After a moment’s 
pause, the man got in at the window. John was not 
at all surprised at this, either. There had been so much 
getting in and out of window in the course of the last 
hour or so, that he had quite forgotten the door, and 
seemed to have lived among such exercises from in- 
fancy. 

The man wore a large, dark, faded cloak, and a 
slouched hat; he walked up close to John, and looked 
VOL. u. 20 


306 


BAKNABY BUDGE. 


at him. John returned the compliment with inter* 
est. 

“ How long have you been sitting thus ? ” said the, 
man. 

John considered, but nothing came of it. 

“ Which way have the party gone ? ” 

Some wandering speculations relative to the fashion 
of the stranger’s boots, got into Mr. Willet’s mind by 
some accident or other, but they got out again in a hurry, 
and left him in his former state. 

“ You would do well to speak,” said the man : “ you 
may keep a whole skin, though you have nothing else 
left that can be hurt. Which way have the party 
gone ? ” 

“That!” said John, finding his voice all at once, and 
nodding with perfect good faith — he couldn’t point ; he 
was so tightly bound — in exactly the opposite direction 
to the right one. 

“ You lie ! ” said the man angrily, and with a threat- 
ening gesture. ‘‘ I came that way. You would betray 
me.” 

It was so evident that John’s imperturbability was not 
assumed, but was the result of the late proceedings un- 
der his roof, that the man stayed his hand in the very 
act of striking him, and turned away. 

John looked after him without so much as a twitch in 
a single nerve of his face. He seized a glass, and hold- 
ing it under one of the little casks until a few drops were 
collected, drank them greedily off ; then throwing it 
down upon the floor impatiently, he took the vessel in 
his hands and drained it into his throat. Some scraps 
of bread and meat were scattered about, and on these 
be fell next ; eating them with voracity, and pausing 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


307 


every now and then to listen for some fancied noise 
outside. When he had refreshed himself in this man- 
ner with violent haste, and raised another barrel to his 
lips, he pulled his hat upon his brow as though he were 
about to leave the house, and turned to John. 

“ Where are your servants ? ” 

Mr. Willet indistinctly remembered to have heard the 
rioters calling to them to throw the key of the room in 
which they were, out of window, for their keeping. He 
therefore replied “ Locked up.” 

“ Well for them if they remain quiet, and well for you 
if you do the like,” said the man. “ Now show me the 
.way the party went.” 

This time Mr. Willet indicated it correctly. The man 
was huft*ying to the door, when suddenly there came 
towards them on the wind, the loud and rapid tolling 
of an alarm-bell, and then a bright and vivid glare 
streamed up, which illumined, not only the whole cham- 
ber, but all the country. 

It was not the sudden change from darkness to this 
dreadful light, it was not the sound of distant shrieks 
and shouts of triumph, it was not this dread invasion of 
the serenity and peace of night, that drove the man back 
as though a thunderbolt had struck him. It was the 
Bell. If the ghastliest shape the human mind has ever 
pictured in its wildest dreams had risen up before him, 
he could not have staggered backward from its touch, as 
he did from the first sound of that loud iron voice. With 
eyes that started from his head, his limbs convulsed, his 
face most horrible to see, he raised one arm high up into 
ihe air, and holding something visionary, back and down, 
with his other hand, drove at it as though he held a knife 
^nd stabbed it to the heart. He clutched his hair, and 


308 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


stopped his ears, and travelled madly round and round ; 
then gave a frightful cry, and with it rushed away : still, 
still, the Bell tolled on and seemed to follow him — 
louder and louder, hotter and hotter yet. The glare 
grew brighter, the roar of voices deeper ; the crash of 
heavy bodies falling, shook the air ; bright streams of 
sparks rose up into the sky ; but louder than them all 
— rising faster far, to Heaven — a million times more 
fierce and furious — pouring forth dreadful secrets after 
its long silence — speaking the language of the dead — 
the Bell — the Bell ! 

What hunt of spectres could surpass that dread pur- 
suit and flight ! Had there been a legion of them on 
his track, he could have better borne it. They would 
have had a beginning and an end, but here ftll space 
was full. The one pursuing voice was everywhere : it 
sounded in the earth, the air ; shook the long grass, 
and howled among the trembling trees. The echoes 
caught it up, the owls hooted as it flew upon the breeze, 
the nightingale was silent and hid herself among the 
thickest boughs : it seemed to goad and urge the angry 
fire, and lash it into madness ; everything was steeped in 
one prevailing red ; the glow was everywhere ; nature 
was drenched in blood : still the remorseless crying of 
that awful voice — the Bell, the Bell ! 

It ceased ; but not in his ears. The knell was at his 
heart. No work of man had ever voice like that which 
sounded there, and warned him that it cried unceasingly 
to Heaven. Who could hear that bell, and not know 
what it said ! There was murder in every note — cruel, 
relentless, savage murder — the murder of a confiding 
man, by oue who held his every trust. Its ringing sum- 
moned phantoms from their graves. What face was that, 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


309 


ill which a friendly smile changed to a look of half in- 
credulous horror, which stiffened for a moment into one 
of pain, then changed again into an imploring glance at 
Heaven, and so fell idly down with upturned eyes, like 
the dead stags he had often peeped at when a little 
child : shrinking and shuddering — there was a dread- 
ful thing to think of now ! — and clinging to an apron 
as he looked ! He sank upon the ground, and grovelling 
down as if he would dig himself a place to hide in, cov- 
ered his face and ears : but no, no, no — a hundred walls 
and roofs of brass would not shut out that bell, for in it 
spoke the wrathful voice of God, and from that voice, 
the whole wide universe could not afford a refuge ! 

While he rushed up and down, not knowing where to 
turn, and while he lay crouching there, the work went 
briskly on indeed. When .they left the Maypole, the 
rioters formed into a solid body, and advanced at a 
quick pace towards the Warren. Rumor of their ap- 
proach having gone before, they found the garden doors 
fast closed, the windows made secure, and the house pro- 
foundly dark : not a light being visible in any portion of 
the building. After some fruitless ringing at the bells, 
and beating at the iron gates, they drew off a few paces 
to reconnoitre, and confer upon the course it would be 
best to take. 

Very little conference was needed, when all were bent 
upon one desperate purpose, infuriated with liquor, and 
flushed with successful riot. The word being given to 
surround the house, some climbed the gates, or dropped 
into the shallow trench and scaled the garden wall, while 
others pulled down the solid iron fence, and while they 
made a breach to enter by, made deadly weapons of the 
bars. The house being completely encircled, a small 


310 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


number of men were despatched to break open a tool- 
shed in the garden ; and during their absence on this 
errand, the remainder contented themselves with knock- 
ing violently at the doors, and calling to those within, to 
come down and open them on peril of their lives. 

No answer being returned to this repeated summons, 
and the detachment who had been sent away, coming 
back with an accession of pickaxes, spades, and hoes, 
they, — together with those who had such arms already, 
or carried (as many did) axes, poles, and crowbars, — 
struggled into the foremost rank, ready to beset the 
doors and windows. They had not at this time more 
than a dozen lighted torches among them ; but when 
these preparations were completed, flaming links were 
distributed and passed from hand to hand with such ra- 
pidity, that, in a minute’s time, at least two thirds of the 
whole roaring mass, bore, each man in his hand, a blaz- 
ing brand. Whirling these about their heads they raised 
a loud shout, and fell to work upon the doors and win- 
dows. 

Amidst the clattering of heavy blows, the rattling of 
broken glass, the cries and execrations of the mob, and 
all the din and turmoil of the scene, Hugh and his 
friends kept together at the turret door where Mr. 
Haredale had last admitted him and old John Willet ; 
and spent their united force on that. It was a strong old 
oaken door, guarded by good bolts and a heavy bar, but 
it soon went crashing in upon the narrow stairs behind, 
and made, as it were, a platform to - facilitate their tear 
ing up into the rooms above. Almost at the same mo- 
ment, a dozen other points were forced, and at every one 
the crowd poured in like water. 

A few armed servant-men were posted in the hall, 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


311 


and when the rioters forced an entrance there, they 
fired some half a dozen shots. But these taking no 
effect, and the concourse coming on like an army of 
devils, they only thought of consulting their own safety, 
and retreated, echoing their assailants’ cries, and hoping 
in the confusion to be taken for rioters themselves ; in 
which stratagem they succeeded, with the exception of 
one old man who was never heard of again, and was 
said to have had his brains beaten out with an iron 
bar (one of his fellows reported that he had seen the 
old man fall), and to have been afterwards burnt in 
the flames. 

The besiegers being now in complete possession of the 
house, spread themselves over it from garret to cellar, 
and plied their demon labors fiercely. While some 
small parties kindled bonfires underneath the windows, 
others broke up the furniture and cast the fragments 
down to feed the flames below where the apertures in 
the wall (windows no longer) were large enough, they 
threw out tables, chests of drawers, beds, mirrors, pic- 
tures, and flung them whole into the fire ; while every 
fresh addition to the blazing masses was received with 
shouts, and howls, and yells, which added new and dis- 
mal terrors to the conflagration. Those who had axes 
and had spent their fury on the movables, chopped and 
tore down the doors and window-frames, broke up the 
flooring, hewed away the rafters and buried men who 
lingered in the upper rooms, in heaps of ruins. Some 
searched the drawers, the chests, the boxes, writing- 
desks, and closets, for jewels, plate, and money; while 
others, less mindful of gain and more mad for destruc- 
tion, cast their whole contents into the court-yard with- 
out examination, and called to those below, to heap 


812 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


them on the blaze. Men who had been into the cellars; 
and had staved the casks, rushed to and fro stark mad, 
setting fire to all they saw — often to the dresses of 
their own friends — and kindling the building in so 
many parts that some had no time for escape, and 
were seen, with drooping hands and blackened faces, 
hanging senseless on the window-sills to which they 
had crawled, until they were sucked and drawn into 
the burning gulf. The more the fire crackled and 
raged, the wilder and more cruel the men grew ; as 
though moving in that element they became fiends, and 
changed their earthly nature for the qualities that give 
delight in hell. 

The burning pile, revealing rooms and passages red- 
hot, through gaps made in the crumbling walls ; the 
tributary fires that licked the outer bricks and stones, 
with their long forked tongues, and ran up to meet the 
glowing mass within ; the shining of the flames upon 
the villains who looked on and fed them ; the roaring 
of the angry blaze, so bright and high that it seemed 
in its rapacity to have swallowed up the very smoke ; 
the living flakes the wind bore rapidly away and hur- 
ried on with, like a storm of fiery snow ; the noiseless 
breaking of great beams of wood, which fell like feathers 
on the heap of ashes, and crumbled in the very act to 
sparks and powder ; the lurid tinge that overspread the 
sky, and the darkness, very deep by contrast, which 
prevailed around ; the exposure to the coarse, common 
gaze, of every little nook which usages of home had 
made a sacred place, and the destruction by rude hands 
of every little household favorite which old associations 
made a dear and precious thing: all this taking place 
— not among pitying looks and friendly murmurs of 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


312 


compasBsion, but brutal shouts and exultations, which 
seemed to make the very rats Avho stood by the old 
house too long, creatures with some claim upon the pity 
and regard of those its roof had sheltered : — combined 
to form a scene never to be forgotten by those who 
saw it and were not actors in the work, so long as life 
endured. 

And who were they ? The alarm-bell rang — and it 
was pulled by no faint or hesitating hands — for a dong 
time ; but not a soul was seen. Some of the insurgents 
said that when it ceased, they heard the shrieks of 
women, and saw some garments fluttering in the air, 
as a party of men bore away no unresisting burdens. 
No one could say that this was true or false, in such an 
uproar ; but where was Hugh ? Who among them had 
seen him, since the forcing of the doors? The cry spread 
through the body. Where was Hugh ! 

“ Here ! ” he hoarsely cried, appearing from the dark- 
ness ; out of breath, and blackened with the smoke. 
“ We have done all we can ; the fire is burning itself 
out ; and even the corners where it hasn’t spread, are 
nothing but heaps of ruins. Disperse, my lads, while 
the coast’s clear; get back by different ways; and meet as 
usual ! ” With that, he disappeared again, — contrary 
to his wont, for he was always first to advance, and last 
to go away, — leaving them to follow homewards as 
they would. 

It was not an easy task to draw oflP such a throng 
If Bedlam gates had been flung open wide, there would 
not have issued forth such maniacs as the frenzy of that 
night had made. There were men there who danced 
and trampled on the beds of flow^ers as though they 
trod down human enemies, and wrenched them from the 


814 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


stalks, like savages who twisted human necks. There 
were men who cast their lighted torches in the air, and 
suffered them to fall upon their heads and faces, blis- 
tering the skin with deep unseemly burns. There were 
men who rushed up to the fire, and paddled in it with 
their hands as if in water; and others who were re- 
strained by force from plunging in, to gratify their 
deadly longing. On the skull of one drunken lad — 
not twenty, by his looks — who lay upon the ground 
with a bottle to his mouth, the lead from the roof came 
streaming down in a shower of liquid fire, white hot; 
melting his head like wax. When the scattered parties 
were collected, men — living yet, but singed as with hot 
irons — were plucked out of the cellars, and carried off 
upon the shoulders of others, who strove to wake them 
as they went along, with ribald jokes, and left them, 
dead, in the passages of hospitals. But of all the howl- 
ing throng not one learnt mercy from, or sickened at, 
these sights ; nor was the fierce, besotted, senseless rage 
of one man glutted. 

Slowly, and in small clusters, with hoarse hurrahs 
and repetitions of their usual cry, the assembly dropped 
away. The last few red-eyed stragglers reeled after 
those who had gone before ; the distant noise of men 
calling to each other, and whistling for others whom 
they missed, grew fainter and fainter ; at length even 
these sounds died away, and silence reigned alone. 

Silence indeed ! The glare of the flames had sunk 
into a fitful flashing light ; and the gentle stars, invisible 
till now, looked down upon the blackening heap. A dull 
smoke hung upon the ruin, as though to hide it from 
those eyes of Heaven ; and the wind forebore to move 
it. Bare walls, roof open to the sky — chambers, where 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


315 


the beloved dead had, many and many a fair day, risen 
to new life and energy ; where so many dear ones had 
been sad and . merry ; which were connected with so 
many thoughts and hopes, regrets and changes — all 
gone. Nothing left but a dull and dreary blank — a 
smouldering heap of dust and ashes — the silence an 
solitude of utter desolation. 




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BARNABY RUDGE 


A TALE OF THE RIOTS OF 'EIGHTY. 


VOLUME III. 




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BARNABY RUDGE 


CHAPTER LVI. 

The Maypole cronies, little dreaming of the change 
BO soon to come upon their favorite haunt, struck through 
the Forest path upon their way to London ; and avoid- 
ing the main road*, which was hot and dusty, kept to the 
by-paths and the fields. As they drew nearer to their 
destination, they- began to make inquiries of the people 
whom they passed, concerning the riots, and the truth 
or falsehood of the stories they had heard. The answers 
went far beyond any intelligence that had spread to quiet 
Chigwell. One man told them that that afternoon the 
Guards, conveying to Newgate some rioters who had 
been reexamined, had been set upon by the mob and 
compelled to retreat ; another, that the houses of two 
witnesses near Clare Market were about to be pulled 
down when he came away ; another, that Sir George 
Saville’s 4iouse in Leicester Fields was to be burned 
that night, and that it would go hard with Sir George 
if he fell into the people’s hands, as it was he who had 
brought in the Catholic bill. All* accounts agreed that 
the mob were out, in stronger numbers and more nu- 
merous parties than had yet appeared ; that the streets 
were unsafe ; that no man’s house or life was worth an 


6 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


hour’s purchase ; that the public consternation was in- 
creasing every moment ; and that many families had 
already fled the city. One fellow who wore the popular 
color, damned them for not having cockades in their 
hats, and bade them set a good watch to-morrow night 
upon the prison-doors, for the locks would have a strain- 
ing ; another asked if they were fire-proof, that they 
walked abroad without the distinguishing mark of all 
good and true men ; and a third who rode on horseback, 
and was quite alone, ordered them to throw, each man 
a shilling, in his hat, towards the support of the rioters. 
Although they were afraid to refuse compliance with this 
demand, and were much alarmed by these reports, they 
agreed, having come so far, to go forward, and see the 
real state of things with their own eyes. So they pushed 
on quicker, as men do who are excited by portentous 
news ; and ruminating on what they had heard, spoke 
little to each other. 

It was now night, and as they came nearer to the city, 
they had dismal confirmation of this intelligence in three 
great fires, all close together, which burnt fiercely and 
were gloomily reflected in the sky. Arriving in the im- 
mediate suburbs, they found that almost every house had 
chalked upon its door in large characters “ No Popery,” 
that the shops were shut, and that alarm and anxiety 
were depicted in every face they passed. 

Noting these .things with a degree of apprehension 
which neither of the three cared to impart, in its full 
extent, to his companions, they came to a turnpike gate, 
which was shut. They were passing through the turn- 
stile on the path, when a horseman rode up from London 
at a hard gallop, and called to the toll-keeper in a voice 
of great agitation, to open quickly in the name of God. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


7 


The adjuration was so earnest, and vehement, that the 
man, with the lantern in his hand, came running out — 
toll-keeper though he was — and was about to throw the 
gate open, when happening to look behind him, he ex- 
claimed, “ Good Heaven, what’s that ! Another fire ! ” 

At this, the three turned their heads, and saw in the 
distance — straight in the direction whence they had 
c^e — a broad sheet of flame, casting a threatening 
light upon the clouds, which glimmered as though the 
conflagration were behind them, and showed like a 
wrathful sunset. 

“ My mind misgives me,” said the horseman, “ or I 
know from what far building those flames come. Don’t 
stand aghast, my good fellow. Open the gate ! ” 

“ Sir,” cried the man, laying his hand upon his horse’s 
bridle as he let him through : “ I know you now, sir ; be 
advised by me ; do not go on. I saw them pass, and 
know what kind of men they are. You will be mur- 
dered.” 

“ So be it ! ” said the horseman, looking intently tow- 
ards the fire, and not at him who spoke. 

“ But sir — sir,” cried the* man, grasping at his rein 
more tightly yet, “ if you do go on, wear the blue ribbon. 
Here, sir,” he added, taking one from his own hat, “ it’s 
necessity, not choice, that makes me wear it : it’s love 
of life and home, sir. Wear it for this one night, sir ; 
only for this one night.” 

“ Do ! ” cried the three friends, pressing round his 
norse. “ Mr. Haredale — worthy sir — good gentleman 
— pray be persuaded.” 

“ Who’s that ? ” cried Mr. Haredale, stooping down to 
look. “ Did I hear Daisy’s voice ? ’ 

“ You did, sir,” cried the little man. “ Do be per- 


8 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


suaded, sir. This gentleman says very true. Your life 
may hang upon it.” 

“ Are you,” said Mr. Haredale, abruptly, “ afraid to 
come with me ? ” 

“I, sir? — N-n-no.” i 

Put that ribbon in your hat. If we meet the rioters, 
swear that I took you prisoner for wearing it. I will 
tell them so with my own lips ; for as I hope for mei^ 
when I die, I will take no quarter from them, nor shall 
they have quarter from me, if we come hand to hand 
to-night. Up here — behind me — quick!. Clasp me 
tight round the body, and fear nothing.” 

In an instant they were riding away, at full gallop, in 
a dense cloud of dust, and speeding on, like hunters in a 
dream. 

It was well the good horse knew the road he trav- 
ersed, for never once — no, never once in all the jour- 
ney — did Mr. Haredale cast his eyes upon the ground, 
or turn them, for an instant, from the light towards which 
they sped so madly. Once he said in a low voice “ It is 
my house,” but that was the only time he spoke. When 
they came to dark and dohbtful places, he never forgot 
to put his hand upon the little man to hold him more 
securely in his seat, but he kept his head erect and his 
eyes fixed on the fire, then, and always. 

The road was dangerous enough, for they went the 
nearest way — headlong, — far from the highway — by/ 
lonely lanes and paths, where wagon-wheels had worn^ 
deep ruts; where hedge and ditch hemmed in the narrow 
strip of ground ; and tall trees, arching overhead, made] 
it profoundly dark. But on, on, on, with neither stopi 
nor stumble, till they reached the Maypole door, and 
could plainly see that the fire began to fade, as if for^ 
want of fuel. 


BAKNABY BUDGE. 


9 


^ Down — for one moment — for but one moment,” 
said Mr. Haredale, helping Daisy to the ground, and 
following himself. “ Willet — Willet — where are my 
niece and servants — Willet ! ” 

Crying to him distractedly, he rushed into the bar. — 
The landlord bound and fastened to his chair ; the place 
dismantled, stripped, and pulled about his ears; — no- 
body could have taken shelter here. 

He was a strong man, accustomed to restrain himself, 
and suppress his strong emotions ; but this preparati<Mi 
for what was to follow — though he had seen that fire 
burning, and knew that his house must be razed to the 
ground — was more than he could bear. He covered 
his face with his hands for a moment, and turned away 
his head. 

“ Johnny, Johnny,” said Solomon — and the simple- 
hearted fellow cried outright, and wrung his hands — 
“ Oh dear old Johnny, here’s a change ! That the May- 
pole bar should come to this, and we should live to see 
it! The old Warren too, Johnny — Mr. Haredale — 
oh, Johnny, what a piteous sight this is ! ” 

Pointing to Mr. Haredale as he said these words, 
little Solomon Daisy put his elbows on the back of Mr. 
Willet’s chair, and fairly blubbered on his shoulder. 

While Solomon was speaking, old John sat, route as 
a stock-fish, staring at him with an unearthly glare, and 
displaying, by every possible symptom, entire and com- 
plete unconsciousness. But when Solomon was silent 
again, John followed, with his great round eyes, the di- 
rection of his looks, and did appear to have some dawn- 
ing distant notion that somebpdy had come to see him. 

“ You know us, don’t you, Johnny ? ” said the Httle 
derk, rapping himself on the breast. “ Daisy, you know 


10 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


■ — Chigwell Church — bell-ringer — little desk on Sun- 
days — eh, Johnny ? ” 

Mr. Willet reflected for a few moments, and then 
muttered, as it were mechanically : “ Let us sing to the 
praise and glory of” — 

Yes, to be sure,” cried the little man, hastily ; “that’s 
it — that’s me, Johnny. You’re all right now, a’n’t you ? 
Say you’re all right, Johnny.” 

“ All right ? ” pondered Mr. Willet, as if that were a 
matter entirely between himself and his conscience. “All 
right? Ah!” 

“ They haven’t been misusing you with sticks, or 
pokers, or any other blunt instruments, — have they, 
Johnny ? ” asked Solomon, with a very anxious glance 
at Mr. Willet’s head. “They didn’t beat you, did 
they ? ” 

John knitted his brow ; looked downwards, as if he 
were mentally engaged in some arithmetical calculation ; 
then upwards, as if the total would not come at his call ; 
then at Solomon Daisy, from his eyebrow to his shoe- 
buckle ; then very slowly round the bar. And then a 
great, round, leaden-looking, and not at all transparent 
tear, came rolling out of each eye, and he said, as he 
shook his head: — 

“ If they’d only had the goodness to murder me. I’d 
have thanked ’em kindly.” 

“ No, no, no, don’t say that, Johnny,” whimpered his 
little friend. “ It’s very, very bad, but not quite so bad 
as that. No, no ! ” 

“ Look’ee here, sir ! ” cried John, turning his rueful 
eyes on Mr. Haredale, who. had dropped on one knee, 
jind was hastily beginning to untie his bonds. “ Look’ee 
here, sir ! The very Maypole — the old dumb Maypole 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


11 


— stares in at the winder, as if it said, ‘John Willet, 
John Willet, let’s go and pitch ourselves in the nighest 
pool of water as is deep enough to hold us ; for our day 
is over 1 ’ ” 

“ Don’t, Johnny, don’t,” cried his friend : no less af- 
fected by this mournful effort of Mr. Willet’s imagina- 
tion, than by the sepulchral tone in which he had spoken 
for the Maypole. “ Please don’t, Johnny ! ” 

“ Your loss is great, and your misfortune a heavy 
one,” said Mr. Haredale, looking restlessly towards the 
door : “ and this is not a time to comfort you. If it 
were, I am in no condition to do so. Before I leave 
you, tell me one thing, and try to tell me plainly, I im- 
plore you. Have you seen, or heard of Emma?” 

“No!” said Mr. Willet 

“ Nor any one but these blood-hounds ? ” 

“No!” 

“ They rode away, I trust in Heaven, before these 
dreadful scenes began,” said Mr. Haredale, who, betwe^ 
his agitation, his eagerness to mount his horse again, 
and the dexterity with which the cords were tied, had 
scarcely yet undone one knot. “A knife, Daisy!” 

“ You didn’t,” said John, looking about, as though he 
had lost his pocket-handkerchief or some such slight ar- 
ticle — “ either of you, gentlemen — see a — a coffin 
anywheres, did you ? ” 

“ Willet ! ” died Mr. Haredale. Solomon dropped 
the knife, and instantly becoming limp from head to 
foot, exclaimed “Good gracious!” 

— “ Because,” said John, not at all regarding them, 
“ a dead man called a little time ago, on his way yonder. 
I could have told you what name was on the plate, if he 
bad brought his coffin with him, and |pft it behind. If 
he didn’t, it don’t signify.” 


12 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


His landlord, who had listened to these words with 
breathless attention, started that moment to his feet ; 
and, without a word, drew »Solomon Daisy to the door, 
mounted his horse, took him up behind again, and flew 
rather than galloped towards the pile of ruins, which 
that day’s sun had shone upon, a stately house. Mr. 
Willet stared after them, listened, looked down upon 
himself to make quite sure that he was still unbound, 
and, without any manifestation of impatience, disap- 
pointment, or surprise, gently relapsed into the con- 
dition from which he had so imperfectly recovered. 

Mr. Haredale tied his horse to the trunk of a tree, 
and grasping his companion’s arm, stole softly along the 
footpath, and into what had been the garden of his house. 
He stopped for an instant to look upon its smoking walls, 
and at the stars that shone through roof and floor upon 
the heap of crumbling ashes. Solomon glanced timidly 
in his face, but his lips were tightly pressed together, a 
resolute and stern expression sat upon his brow, and not 
a tear, a look, or gesture indicating grief, escaped him. 

He drew his sword ; felt for a moment in his breast, 
as though he carried other arms about him ; then grasp- 
ing Solomon by the wrist again, went with a cautious 
step all round the house. He looked into every door- 
way and gap in the wall ; retraced his steps at every 
rustling of the air among the leaves ; and searched in 
every shadowed nook with outstretched hands. Thus 
they made the circuit of the building : but they returned 
to the spot from which they had set out, without encoun- 
tering any human being, or finding the least trace of any 
concealed straggler. 

After a short pause, Mr. Haredale shouted twice or 
thrice. Then cried aloud, “ Is there any one in hiding 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


.13 


here, who knows my voice ! There is nothing to fear 
now. If any of my people are here, I entreat them to 
answer 1” He called them all by name ; his voice was 
echoed in many mournful tones ; then all was silent 
as before. 

They were standing near the foot of the turret, where 
the alarm-bell hung. The fire had raged there, and the 
floors had been sawn, and hewn, and beaten down, be- 
sides. It was open to the night ; but a part of the stair- 
case still remained, winding upward from a great mound 
of dust and cinders. Fragments of the jagged and 
broken steps offered an insecure and giddy footing here 
and there, and then were lost again, behind protruding 
angles of the wall, or in the deep shadows cast upon it 
by other portions of the ruin ; for by this time the moon 
had risen, and shone brightly. 

As they stood here, listening to the echoes as they 
died away, and hoping in vain to hear a voice they 
knew, some of the ashes in this turret slipped and rolled 
down. Startled by the least noise in that melancholy 
place, Solomon looked up at his companion’s face, and 
saw that he had turned towards the spot, and that he 
watched and listened keenly. 

He covered the little man’s mouth with his hand, and 
looked again. Instantly, with kindling eyes, he bade 
him on his life keep still, and neither speak nor move. 
Then holding his breath, and stooping down, he stole 
into the turret, with his drawn sword in his hand, and 
disappeared. 

Terrified to be left there by himself, under such deso- 
late circumstances, and after all he had seen and heard 
that night, Solomon would have followed, but there had 
been something in Mr. Haredale’s manner and his look. 


14 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


the recollection of which held him spellbound. He 
stood rooted to the spot ; and scarcely venturing to 
breathe, looked up with mingled fear and w'ohder. 

Again the ashes slipped and rolled — very, very softly 

— again — and then again, as though they crumbled 
underneath the tread of a stealthy foot. And now a 
figure was dimly visible ; climbing very softly ; and 
often stopping to look down ; now it pursued its diffi- 
cult way ; and now it was hidden from the view again. 

It emerged once more, into the shadowy and uncertain 
light — higher now, but not much, for the way was steep 
and toilsome, and its progress very slow. What phantom 
of the brain did he pursue ; and why did he look down 
so constantly. He knew he was alone Surely his 
mind was not affected by that night’s loss and agony. 
He was not about to throw himself headlong from the 
summit of the tottering wall. Solomon turned sick, and^ 
clasped his hands. His limbs trembled beneath him, and 
a cold sweat broke out upon his pallid face. 

If he complied with Mr. Haredale’s last injunction 
now, it was because he had not the power to speak or 
move. He strained his gaze, and fixed it on a patch of 
moonlight, into which, if he continued to ascend, he must 
soon emerge. When he appeared there, he would try to 
call to him. 

Again the ashes slipped and crumbled ; some stones 
rolled down, and fell with a dull, heavy sound upon the 
ground below. He kept his eyes upon the piece of 
moonlight. The figure was coming on, for its shadow 
was already thrown upon the wall. Now it appeared 

— and now looked round at him — and now — 

The horror-stricken clerk uttered a scream that pierced 
the air, and cried “ The ghost ! The ghost ! ” 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


1 .) 


Long before the echo of his cry had died away, an- 
other form rushed out into the light, flung itself upon the 
foremost one, knelt down upon its breast, and clutched its 
throat with both hands. 

“ Villain ! ” cried Mr. Haredale, in a terrible voice — 
for it was he. “ Dead and buried, as all men supposed 
through your infernal arts, but reserved by Heaven for 
this — at last — at last — I have you. You, whose 
hands are red with my brother’s blood, and that of his 
faithful servant, shed to conceal your own atrocious guilt 
— You, Rudge, double murderer and monster, I arrest 
you in the name of God, who has delivered you into my 
hands. No. Though you had the strength of twenty 
men,” he added, as the murderer writhed and strug- 
gled, “you could not escape me, or loosen my grasp 
to-night ! ” 


16 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


CHAPTER LVIL 

Barnabt, armed as we have seen, continued to pace 
up and down before the stable-door ; glad to be alone 
again, and heartily rejoicing in the unaccustomed silence 
and tranquillity. After the whirl of noise and riot in 
which the last two days had been passed, the pleasures 
of solitude and peace were enhanced a thousand-fold. 
He felt quite happy ; and as he leaned upon his staff 
and mused, a bright smile overspread his face, and none 
but cheerful visions floated into his brain. 

Had he no thoughts of her, whose sole delight he was, 
and whom he had unconsciously plunged in such bitter 
sorrow and such deep afliiction ? Oh yes. She was at 
the heart of all his cheerful hopes and proud reflections. 
It was she whom all this honor and distinction were to 
gladden ; the joy and profit were for her. What delight 
it gave her to hear of the bravery of her poor boy ! Ah ! 
He would have known that, without Hugh’s telling him. 
And what a precious thing it was to know she lived so 
happi-ly, and heard with so much pride (he pictured to 
himself her look when they told her) that he was iii 
such high esteem : bold among the boldest, and trusted 
before them all. And when these frays were over, and 
the good lord had conquered his enemies, and they were 
all at peace again, and he and she were rich, what happi- 
jiess they would have in talking of these troubled times 
when he was a great soldier ; and when they sat alone 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


17 


together in the tranquil twilight, and she had no longer 
reason to be anxious for the morrow, what pleasure 
would he have in the reflection that this was his doing 
— his — poor foolish Barnaby’s ; and in patting her on 
the cheek, and saying with a merry laugh, “ Am I silly 
now, mother — am I silly now ?’” 

With a lighter heart and step, and eyes the brighter 
for the happy tear that dimmed them for a moment, 
Barnaby resumed his walk ; and singing gayly to him- 
self, kept guard upon his quiet post. 

His comrade Grip, the partner of his watch, though 
fond of basking in the sunshine, preferred to-day to walk 
about the stable ; having a great deal to do in the way 
of scattering the straw, hiding under it such small ar- 
ticles as had been casually left about, and haunting 
Hugh’s bed, to which he seemed to have taken a par- 
ticular attachment. Sometimes Barnaby looked in and 
called him, and then he came hopping out ; but he 
merely did this as a concession to his master’s weak- 
ness, and soon returned again to his own grave pur- 
suits : peering into the straw with his bill, and rapidly 
covering up the place, as if, Midas-like, he were whis- 
pering secrets to the earth and buiying them ; constantly 
busying himself upon the sly ; and affecting, whenever 
Barnaby came past, to look up in the clouds and have 
nothing whatever on his mind : in short, conducting him- 
self, in many respects, in a more than usually thought- 
ful, deep, and mysterious manner. 

As the day crept on, Barnaby, who had no directions 
forbidding him to eat and drink upon his post, but had 
been, on the contrary, supplied with a bottle of beer 
and a*basket of provisions, determined to break his fast, 
which he had not done since morning. To this endr 

VOL. TTf 2 


18 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


be sat down on the ground before the door, and put' 
ting his staff across his knees in case of alarm or sur- 
prise, summoned Grip to dinner. 

This call, the bird obeyed with great alacrity ; cry- 
ing, as he sidled up to his master, “ I’m a devil, I’m 
a Polly, I’m a kettle, I’m a Protestant, No Popery!” 
Having learnt this latter sentiment from the gentry 
among whom he had lived of late, he delivered it with 
uncommon emphasis. 

“ Well said, Grip 1 ” cried his master, as he fed him 
with the daintiest bits. “ Well said, old boy I ” 

“ Never say die, bow wow wow, keep up your spirits, 
Grip, Grip, Grip, Holloa I We’ll all have tea, I’m a 
Protestant kettle. No Popery!” cried the raven. 

“ Gordon forever. Grip ! ” cried Barnaby. 

The raven, placing his head upon the ground, looked 
at his master sideways, as though he would have said, 
“ Say that again ! ” Perfectly understanding his desire, 
Barnaby repeated the phrase a great many times. The 
bird listened with profound attention ; sometimes repeat- 
ing the popular cry in a low voice, as if to compare 
the two, and try if it would at all help him to this 
new accomplishment ; sometimes flapping his wings, or 
barking ; and sometimes in a kind of desperation draw- 
ing a multitude of corks, with extraordinary vicious- 
ness. 

Barnaby was so intent upon his favorite, that he was 
not at first aware of the approach of two persons on 
horseback, who were riding at a footpace, and coming 
straight towards his post. When he perceived them, 
however, which he did when they were within some fifty 
yards of him, he jumped hastily up, and ordering Grip 
within doors, stood with both hands on his staff, wait- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


19 


ing until he should know whether they were friends or 
foes. 

He had hardly done so, when he observed that those 
who advanced were a gentleman and his servant ; al- 
most at the same moment he recognized Lord George 
Gordon, before whom he stood uncovered, with his eyes 
turned towards the ground. 

" Good-day ! ” said Lord George, not reining in his 
horse until he was close beside him. Well ! ” 

“ All quiet, sir, all safe I ” cried Barnaby. “ The rest 
are away — they went by that path* — that one. A 
grand party ! ” 

“Ay?” said Lord George, looking thoughtfully at 
him. “ And you ? ” 

“ Oh ! They left me here to watch — to mount guard 

— to keep everything secure till they come back. I’ll 
do it, sir, for your sake. You’re a good gentleman ; a 
kind gentleman — ay, you are. There are many against 
you, but we’ll be a match for them, never fear ! ” 

“ What’s that ? ” said Lord George — pointing to the 
raven who was peeping out of the stable-door — but still 
looking thoughtfully, and in some perplexity, it seemed, 
at Barnaby. 

“ Why, don’t you know ! ” retorted Barnaby, with a 
wondering laugh. “ Not know what is ! A bird, to 
be sure. My bird — my friend — Grip.” 

“A devil, a kettle, a Grip, a Polly, a Protestant, no 
Popery ! ” cried the raven. 

^ Though, indeed,” added Barnaby, laying his hand 
upon the neck of Lord George’s horse, and speaking 
boftly : “ you had good reason to ask me what he L, 
for sometimes it puzzles me — and I am used to him 

— to think he’s only a bird. He’s my brother. Grip 


10 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


is — always with me — always talking — always merry 
— eh, Grip ? ” 

The raven answered by an affectionate croak, and 
hopping on his master’s arm, which he held downward 
for that purpose, submitted with an air of perfect in- 
difference to be fondled, and turned his restless, curious 
eye, now upon Lord George, and now upon his man. 

Lord George, biting his nails in a discomfited manner, 
regarded Barnaby for some time in silence ; then beck- 
oning to his servant, said: — 

“ Come hither, John.” 

John Grueby touched his hat, and came. 

“ Have you ever seen this young man before ? ” his 
master asked, in a low voice. 

“ Twice, my lord,” said John. ‘‘ I see him in the 
crowd last night and Saturday.” 

“ Did — did it seem to you that his manner was at 
all wild or strange ? ” Lord George demanded, faltering. 

“Mad,” said John, with emphatic brevity. 

“ And why do you think him mad, sir ? ” said his mas- 
ter, speaking in a peevish tone. “ Don’t use that word 
too freely. Why do you think him mad ? ” 

“ My lord,” John Grueby answered, “ look at his dress, 
look at his eyes, look at his restless way, hear him cry 
‘ No Popery I ’ Mad, my lord.” 

“ So because one man dresses unlike another,” re- 
turned his angry master, glancing at himself, “ and 
happens to differ from other men in his carriage and 
manner, and to advocate a great cause which the cor- 
rupt and irreligious desert, he is to be accounted mad^ 
is he ? ” 

“ Stark, staring, raving, roaring mad, my lord,” re 
turned the unmoved John. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


21 


Do you say this to my face ? ” cried his master, turn- 
ing sharply upon him. 

“ To ary man, my lord, who asks me,” answered 
John. 

“ Mr. Gashford, I find, was right,” said Lord George ; 

I thought him prejudiced, though I ought to have 
known a man like him better than to have supposed 
it possible ! ” 

“ I shall never have Mr. Gashford’s good word, my 
lord,” replied John, touching his hat respectfully, “^and 
I don’t covet it.” 

“ You are an ill-conditioned, most ungrateful fellow,” 
said Lord George : “ a spy, for anything I know. Mr. 
Gashford is perfectly correct, as I might have felt con- 
vinced he was. I have done wrong to retain you in 
my service. It is a tacit insult to him as my choice and 
confidential friend to do so, remembering the cause you 
sided with, on the day he was maligned at Westminster. 
You will leave me to-night — nay, as soon as we reach 
home. The sooner the better.” 

“If it comes to that, I say- so too, my lord. Let 
Mr. Gashford have his will. As to my being a spy, 
my lord, you know me better than to believe it, I am 
sure. I don’t know much about causes. My cause is 
the cause of one man against two hundred ; and I hope 
it always will be.” 

“ You have said quite enough,” returned Lord George, 
motioning him to go back. “ I desire to hear no 
more.” 

“ If you’ll let me add another word, my lord,” returned 
John Grueby, “ I’d give this silly fellow a caution not 
to stay here by himself. The proclamation is in a good 
many hands already, and it’s well known that he was 


22 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


concerned in the business it relates to. He had bettei 
get to a place of safety if he can, poor creature.” 

“ You hear what this man says ? ” cried Lord George, 
addressing Barnaby, who had looked on and wondered 
while this dialogue passed. “ He thinks you may be 
afraid to remain upon your post, and are kept here per- 
haps against your will. What do you say ? ” 

“ I think, young man,” said John, in explanation, 
“ that the soldiers may turn out and take you ; and that 
if they do, you will certainly be hung by the neck till 
you’re dead — dead — dead. And I think you’d bet- 
ter go from here, as fast as you can. That’s what 1 
think.” 

“ He’s a coward. Grip, a coward ! ” cried Barnaby, 
putting the raven on the ground, and shouldering his 
staff. Let them come ! Gordon forever ! Let them 
come ! ” 

“ Ay ! ” said Lord George, “ let them ! Let us see 
who will venture to attack a power like ours ; the sol- 
emn league of a whole people. This a madman ! You 
have said well, very well. I am proud to be the leader 
of such men as you.” 

Barnaby’s heart swelled within his bosom as he heard 
these words. He took Lord George’s hand and carried 
it to his lips ; patted his horse’s crest, as if the affection 
and admiration he had conceived for the man extended 
to the animal he rode ; then unfurled his flag, and 
proudly waving it, resumed his pacing up and down. 

Lord George, with a kindling eye and glowing cheek, 
took off his hat, and flourishing it above his head, bade 
nira exultingly Farewell ! — then cantered off at a brisk 
pace ; after glancing angrily round to see that his ser- 
vant followed. Honest John set spurs to his horse and 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


23 


rode after his master, but not before he had again warned 
Barnaby to retreat, with many significant gestures, which 
indeed he continued to make, and Barnaby to resist, until 
the windings of the road concealed them from each 
other’s view. 

Left to himself again with a still higher sense of the 
importance of his post, and stimulated to enthusiasm by 
the special notice and encouragement of his leader, Bar- 
naby walked to and fro in a delicious trance rather than 
as a waking man. The sunshine which prevailed around 
was in his mind. He had but one desire ungratified. If 
she could only see him now ! 

The day wore on ; its heat was gently giving place to 
the cool of evening ; a light wind sprung up, fanning 
his long hair, and making the banner rustle pleasantly 
above his head. There was a freedom and freshness in 
the sound and in the time, which chimed exactly with 
his mood. He was happier than ever. 

He was leaning on his staflf looking towards the de- 
clining sun, and reflecting with a smile that he stood 
sentinel at that moment over buried gold, when two or 
three figures appeared in the distance, making towards 
the house at a rapid pace, and motioning with • their 
hands as though they urged its inmates to retreat from 
some approaching danger. As they drew nearer, they 
became more earnest in their gestures ; and .they were 
no sooner within hearing, than the foremost among them 
cried that the soldiers were coming up. 

At these words Barnaby furled his flag, and tied it 
round the pole. His heart beat high while he did so, 
but he had no more fear or thought of retreating than 
the pole itself. The friendly stragglers hurried past 
him, after giving him notice of his danger, and quickly 


24 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


passed into the house, where the utmost confusion im- 
mediately prevailed. As those within hastily closed the 
windows and the doors, they urged him by looks and 
signs to fly without loss of time, and called to him many 
times to do so ; but he only shook his head indignantly 
in answer, and stood the firmer on his post. Finding 
that he was not to be persuaded, they took care of them- 
selves ; and leaving the place with only one old woman 
in it, speedily withdrew. 

As yet there had been no symptom of the news hav- 
ing any better foundation than in the fears of those who 
brought it, but The Boot had not been deserted five 
minutes, when there appeared coming across the fields, 
a body of men who, it was easy to see, by the glitter 
of their arms and ornaments in the sun, and by their 
orderly and regular mode of advancing — for they came 
on as one man — were soldiers. In a very little time, 
Barnaby knew that they were a strong detachment of 
the Foot Guards, having along with them two gentlemen 
in private clothes, and a small party of Horse ; the latter 
brought up the rear, and were not in number more than 
six or eight. 

They advanced steadily ; neither quickening their 
pace as they came nearer, nor raising any cry, nor 
showing the least emotion or anxiety. Though this was 
a matter of course in the case of regular troops, even 
to Barnaby there was something particularly impressive 
and disconcerting in it to one accustomed to the noise 
and tumult of an undisciplined mob. For all that, he 
stood his ground not a whit the less resolutely, and 
looked on undismayed. 

Presently, they marched into the yard, and halted. 
The commanding officer despatched a messenger to the 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


25 


horsemen, one of whom came riding back. Some words 
passed between them, and they glanced at Barnaby , 
who well remembered the man he had unhorsed at 
Westminster, and saw him now before his eyes. The 
man being speedily dismissed, saluted, and rode back 
to his comrades, who were drawn up apart at a short 
distance. 

The oflBcer then gave the word to prime and load. 
The heavy ringing of the musket-stocks upon the ground, 
and the sharp and rapid rattling of the ramrods in their 
barrels, were a kind of relief to Barnaby, deadly though 
he knew the purport of such sounds to be. When this 
was done, other commands were given, and the soldiers 
instantaneously formed in single file all round the house 
and stables ; completely encircling them in every part, 
at a distance, perhaps, of some half-dozen yards; at 
least that seemed in Barnaby eyes to be about the 
space left between himself and those who confronted 
him. The horsemen remained drawn up by themselves 
as before. 

The two gentlemen in private clothes who had kept 
aloof, now rode forward, one on either side the offi- 
cer. The proclamation having been produced and 
read by one of them, the officer called on Barnaby to 
surrender. 

He made no answer, but stepping within the door, 
before which he had kept guard, held his pole cross 
wise to protect it. In the midst of a profound silence 
he was again called upon to yield. 

Still he offered no reply. Indeed he had enough to 
do, to run his eye backward and forward along the half- 
dozen men who immediately fronted him, and settle hur- 
riedly within himself at which of them he would strike 


26 


BARNABY KUDGE. 


first, when they pressed on him. He caught the eye of 
one in the centre, and resolved to hew that fellow down, 
though he died for it. 

Again there was a dead silence, and again the same 
voice called upon him to deliver himself up. 

Next moment he was back in the stable, dealing 
blows about him like a madman. Two of the men lay 
stretched at his feet ; the one he had marked, dropped 
first — he had a thought for that, even in the hot blood 
and hurry of the struggle. Another blow — another ! 
Down, mastered, wounded in the breast by a heavy 
blow from the butt-end of a gun (he saw the weapon in 
the act of falling) — breathless — and a prisoner. 

An exclamation of surprise from the officer recalled 
him, in some degree, to himself. He looked round. 
Grip, after working in secret all the afternoon, and with 
redoubled vigor while everybody’s attention was dis- 
tracted, had plucked away the straw from Hugh’s bed, 
and turned up the loose ground with his iron bill. 
The hole had been recklessly filled to the brim, and 
was merely sprinkled with earth. Golden cups, spoons, 
candlesticks, coined guineas — all the riches were re- 
vealed. 

They brought spades and a sack ; dug up everything 
that was hidden there ; and carried away more than two 
men could lift. They handcuffed him and bound his 
arms, searched him, and took away all he had. No- 
body questioned or reproached him, or seemed to have 
much curiosity about him. The two men he had 
stunned, were carried off by their companions in the 
same business-like way in which everything else was 
done. Finally, he was left under a guard of four sol- 
iiers with fixed bayonets, while the officer directed in 


BAR NAB Y RUDGE. 


27 


person the search of the house and the other buildings 
connected with it. 

This was soon completed. The soldiers formed again 
in the yard ; he was marched out, with his guard about 
him ; and ordered to fall in where a space was left. 
The others closed up all round, and so they moved away, 
with the prisoner in the centre. 

When they came into the streets, he felt he was a 
sight : and looking up as they passed quickly along, 
could see people running to the windows a little too late, 
and throwing up the sashes to look after him. Some- 
times he met a staring face beyond the heads above him, 
or under the arms of his conductors, or peering down 
upon him from a wagon-top or coach-box ; but this was 
all he saw, being surrounded by so many men. The 
very noises of the streets seemed muffled and subdued ; 
and the air came stale and hot upon him, like the sickly 
breath of an oven. 

Tramp, tramp. Tramp, tramp. Heads erect, shoul- 
ders square, every man stepping in exact time — all so _ 
orderly and regular — nobody looking at him — nobody 
seeming conscious of his presence, — he could hardly 
believe he was a Prisoner. But at the word, though 
only thought, not spoken, he felt the handcuffs galling 
his wrists, the cord pressing his arms to his sides : the 
loaded guns levelled at his head ; and those cold, bright, 
sharp, shining points turned towards him: the mere look- 
ing down at which, now that he was bound and helpless, 
made the warm current of his life run cold. r 


4 


28 BARNABY RUDGE. 


CHAPTER LVIIL 

They were not long in reaching the barracks, for the 
officer who commanded the party was desirous to avoid 
rousing the people by the display of military force in 
the streets, and was humanely anxious to give as little 
opportunity as possible for any attempt at rescue ; know- 
ing that it must lead to bloodshed and loss of life, and 
that if the civil authorities by whom he was accompa- 
nied, empowered him to order his men to fire, many in- 
nocent persons would probably fall, whom curiosity oi 
idleness had attracted to the spot. He therefore led the 
party briskly on, avoiding with a merciful prudence the 
more public and crowded thoroughfares, and pursuing 
those which he deemed least likely to be infested by dis- 
orderly persons. This wise proceeding not only enabled 
them to gain their quarters without any interruption, but 
completely baffled a body of rioters who had assembled 
in one of the main streets, through which it was consid- 
ered certain they would pass, and who remained gath- 
ered together for the purpose of releasing the prisoner 
from their hands, long after they had deposited him in a 
place of security, closed the barrack-gates, and set a 
double guard at every entrance for its better protection. 

Arrived at this place, poor Barnaby was marched into 
a stone-floored room, where there was a very powerful 
smell of tobacco, a strong thorougli draft of air, and a 
great wooden bedstead, large enough for a score of men. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


29 


Several soldiers in undress were lounging about, or eat- 
ing from tin-cans ; military accoutrements dangled on 
rows of pegs along the whitewashed wall ; and some 
half-dozen men lay fast asleep upon their backs, snoring 
in concert. After remaining here just long enough to 
note these things, he was marched out again, and con- 
veyed across the parade-ground to another portion of 
the building. 

Perhaps a man never sees so much at a glance as 
when he is in a situation of extremity. The chances 
are a hundred to one, that if Barnaby had lounged in at 
the gate to look about him, he would have lounged out 
again with a very imperfect idea of the place, and 
would have remembered very little about it. But as he 
was taken handcuffed across the gravelled area, nothing 
escaped his notice. The dry, arid look of the dusty 
square, and of the bare brick building ; the clothes hang- 
ing at some of the windows ; and the men in their shirt 
sleeves and braces, lolling with half their bodies out of 
the others ; the green sun-blinds at the officers’ quarters, 
and the little scanty trees in front ; the drummer-boys 
practising in a distant court-yard ; the men on drill on 
the parade ; the two soldiers carrying a basket between 
them, who winked to each other as he went by, and 
slyly pointed to their throats ; the spruce Sergeant who 
hurried past with a cane in his hand, and under his arm 
a clasped book with a vellum cover ; the fellows in the 
ground-floor rooms, furbishing and brushing up their dif- 
ferent articles of dress, who stopped to look a^t him, and 
whose voices as they spoke together echoed loudly 
through the empty galleries and passages ; — everything, 
down to the stand of muskets before the guard-house, 
and the drum with a pipe-clayed belt attached, in one 


30 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


corner, impressed itself upon his observation, as though 
he had noticed them in the same place a hundred times, 
or had been a whole day among them, in place of one 
brief hurried minute. 

He was taken into a small paved back-yard, and there 
they opened a great door, plated with iron, and pierced 
some five feet above the ground with a few holes to let 
in air and light. Into this dungeon he was walked 
straightway ; and having locked him up there, and 
placed a sentry over him, they left him to his medi- 
tations. 

The cell, or black-hole, for it had those words painted 
on the door, was very dark, and having recently accom- 
modated a drunken deserter, by no means clean. Bar- 
naby felt his way to some straw at the farther end, and 
looking towards the door, tried to accustom himself to 
the gloom, which, coming from the bright sunshine out 
of doors, was not an easy task. 

There was a kind of portico or colonnade outside, and 
this obstructed even the little light that at the best could 
have found its way through the small apertures in the 
door. The footsteps of the sentinel echoed monotonously 
as he paced its stone pavement to and fro (reminding 
Barnaby of the watch he had so lately kept himself) ; 
and as he passed and repassed the door, he made the 
cell for an instant so black by the interposition of his 
body, that his going away again seemed like the appear- 
ance of a new ray of light, and was quite a circumstance 
to look for. ^ 

When the prisoner had sat some time upon the ground, 
gazing at the chink's, and listening to the advancing and 
receding footsteps of his guard, the man stood still upon 
his post. Barnaby, quite unable to think, or to specu- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


31 


late on what would be done with him, had been lulled 
into a kind of doze by his regular pace ; but his stopping 
roused him ; and then he became aware that two men 
were in conversation under the colonnade, and very near 
the door of his cell. 

How long they had been talking there, he could not 
tell, for he had fallen into an unconsciousness of his real 
position, and when the footsteps ceased, was answering 
aloud some question which seemed to have been put to 
him by Hugh in the stable, though of the fancied pur- 
port, either of question or reply, notwithstanding that he 
awoke with the latter on his lips, he had no recollection 
whatever. The first words that reached his ears, were 
these : 

“ Why is he brought here then, if he has to be taken 
away again so soon ? ” 

“ Why, where would you have him go ! Damme, he’s 
not as safe anywhere as among the king’s -troops, is he ? 
What wovld you do with him ? Would you hand him 
over to a pack of cowardly civilians, that shake in their 
shoes till they wear the soles out, with trembling at the 
threats of the ragamufiins he belongs to ? ” 

“ That’s true enough.” 

“ True enough ! — I’ll tell you what. I wish, Tom 
Green, that I was a commissioned instead of a non-com- 
missioned oflScer, and that I had the command of two 
companies — only two companies — of my own regi- 
ment. Call me out to stop these riots — give me the 
needful authority, and half a dozen rounds of ball-cai> 
tridge ” — 

“ Ay ! ” said the other voice. “ That’s all very well, 
but they won’t give the needful authority. If the magis* 
trate won’t give the word, what’s the officer to do ? ” 


S2 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Not very well knowing, as it seemed, how to overcome 
this difficulty, the other man contented himself with 
damning the magistrates. 

“ With all my heart,” said his friend. 

“ Whereas the use of a magistrate ? ” returned the 
other voice. “ What’s a magistrate in this case, but an 
impertinent, unnecessary, unconstitutional sort of inter- 
ference ? Here’s a proclamation. Here’s a man re- 
ferred to in that proclamation. Here’s proof against 
him, and a witness on the spot. Damme ! Take him 
out and shoot him, sir. Who wants a magistrate ? ” • 

“ When does he go before Sir John Fielding ? ” asked 
the man who had spoken first. 

“ To-night at eight o’clock,” returned the other. 

“ Mark what follows. The magistrate commits him to 
Newgate. Our people take him to Newgate. The riot- 
ers pelt our people. Our people retire before the riot- . 
ers. Stones are thrown, insults are offered, not a shot’s 
fired. Why ? Because of the magistrates. Damn the 
magistrates ! ” 

When he had in some degree relieved his mind by 
cursing the magistrates in various other forms of speech, 
the man was silent, save for a low growling, still having 
reference to those authorities, which from time to time 
escaped him. 4 

Barnaby, who had wit enough to know that this con- s 
versation concerned, and very nearly concerned, himself, 
remained perfectly quiet until they ceased to speak, 
ivhen he groped his way to the door, and peeping 
through the air-holes, tried to make out what kind of 
men they were, to whom he had been listening. 

The one who condemned the civil power in such 
strong terms, was a sergeant — engaged just then, as the 


BARNABY KUDGE. 


33 


Btreaming ribbons in his cap announced, on the recruit- 
ing service. He stood leaning sideways against a pillar 
nearly opposite the door, and as he growled to himself, 
drew figures on the pavement with his cane. The other 
man had his back towards the dungeon, and Barnaby 
could only see his form. To judge from that, he was a 
gallant, manly, handsome fellow, but he had lost his left 
iarm. It had been taken off between the elbow and the 
shoulder, and his empty coat-sleeve hung across his 
breast. 

It was probably this circumstance which gave him an 
interest beyond any that his companion could boast of, 
and attracted Barnaby’s attention. There was some- 
thing soldierly in his bearing, and he wore a jaunty cap 
and jacket. Perhaps he had been in the service at one 
time or other. If ^e had, it could not have been very 
long ago, for he was but a young fellow now. 

“ Well, well,” he said thoughtfully ; “ let the fault be 
where it may, it makes a man sorrowful to come back to 
old England, and see her in this condition.” 

“ I suppose the pigs will join ’em next,” said the ser- 
geant, with an imprecation on the rioters, “ now that the 
birds have set ’em the example.” 

The birds ! ” repeated Tom Green. 

“ Ah — birds ! ” said the sergeant testily; “that’s Eng- 
lish, a’n’t it ? ” 

“ I don’t know what you mean.” 

“ Go to the guard-house, and see. You’ll find a bird 
there, that’s got their cry as pat as any of ’em, and bawls 
No Popery,’ like a man — or like a devil, as he says he 
IS. I shouldn’t wonder. The devil’s loose in London 
somewhere. Damme if I wouldn’t twist his neck round, 
on the chance, if I had my way.” 

VOL. III. 3 


84 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


The young man had taken two or three steps away, as 
if to go and see this creature, when he was arrested by 
the voice of Barnaby. 

“ It’s mine,” he called out, half laughing and half 
weeping — “ my pet, my friend Grip. Ha, ha, ha ! 
Don’t hurt him, he has done no harm. I taught him ; 
it’s my fault. Let me have him, if you please. He’s 
the only friend I have left now. He’ll not dance, or 
talk, or whistle for you, I know ; but he will for me, 
because he knows me, and loves me — though you 
wouldn’t think it — very well. You wouldn’t hurt a 
bird. I’m sure. You’re a brave soldier, sir, and wouldn’t 
harm a woman or a child — no, no, nor a poor bird, I’m 
certain.” 

This latter adjuration was addressed to the sergeant, 
whom Barnaby judged from his reS coat to be high in 
office, and able to seal Grip’s destiny by a word. But 
that gentleman, in reply, surlily damned him for a thief 
and rebel as he was, and with many disinterested impre- 
cations on his own eyes, liver, blood, and body, assured 
him that if it rested with him to decide, he would put a 
final stopper on the bird, and his master too. 

“ You talk boldly to a caged man,” said* Barnaby, in 
anger. “ If I was on the other side of the door and 
there were none to part us, you’d change your note — 
ay, you may toss your head — you would ! Kill the 
bird — do. Kill anything you can, and so revenge 
yourself on those who with their bare hands untied 
could do as much to you ! ” 

Having vented his defiance, he flung himself into the 
farthest corner of his prison, and muttering, “ Good-by, 
Grip — good-by, dear old Grip ! ” shed tears for the first 
time since he had been taken captive ; and hid his face 
in the straw. 


BAUNABY RUDGE. 


35 


He had had some fancy at firvSt, that the one-armed man 
would help him, or would give him a kind word in an- 
swer. He hardly knew w'hy, but he hoped and thought 
so. The young fellow had stopped when he called out, 
and checking himself in the very act of turning round, 
stood listening to every word he said. Perhaps he built 
his feeble trust on this ; perhaps on his being young, and 
having a frank and honest manner. However that might 
be, he built on sand. The other went away directly he 
had finished speaking, and neither answered him, nor re- 
turned. No matter. They were all against him here ; 
he might have known as much. Good-by, old Grip, 
good-by ! 

After some time, they came and unlocked the door, 
and called to him to come out. He rose directly, and 
complied, for he would not have them think he was sub- 
dued or frightened. He w^alked out like a man, and 
looked from face to face. 

None of them returned his gaze or seemed to notice 
it. They marched him back to the parade by the w'ay 
they had brought him, and there they halted, among a 
body of soldiers, at least twice as numerous as that 
which had taken him prisoner in the afternoon. The 
officer lie had seen before, bade him in a few brief words 
take notice that if he attempted to escape, no matter how 
favorable a chance he might suppose he had, certain of 
the men had orders to fire upon him, that moment. They 
then closed round him as before, and marched him oflT 
ngain. 

In the same unbroken order they arrived at Bow 
Street, followed and beset on all sides by a crowd which 
was continually increasing. Here he was placed before 
a blind gentleman, and asked if he wished to say any- 


36 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


thing. Not he. What had he got to tell them ? After 
a very little talking, which he was careless of and quite 
indifferent to, they told him he was to go to Newgate, 
and took him away. 

He went out into the street, so surrounded and hemmed 
in on every side by soldiers, that he could see nothing ; 
but he knew there was a great crowd of people, by the 
murmur ; and that they were not friendly to the soldiers, 
was soon rendered evident by their yells and hisses. 
How often and how eagerly he listened for the voice 
of Hugh ! No. There was not a voice he knew' among 
them all. Was Hugh a prisoner too? Was there no 
hope ! 

As they came nearer and nearer to the prison, the 
hootings of the people grew more violent ; stones were 
throwm ; and every now and then, a rush was made 
against the soldiers, wdiich they staggered under. One 
of them, close before him, smarting under a blow upon 
the temple, levelled his musket, but the officer struck it 
upwards with his sword, and ordered him on peiil of his 
life to desist. This was the last thing he saw with any 
distinctness, for directly afterw'ards he was tossed about, 
and beaten to and fro, as though in a tempestuous sea. 
But go where he would, there were the same guards 
about him. Twice or thrice he W'as throwm dowm, and 
so were they ; but even then, he could not elude their 
vigilance for a moment. They w'ere up again, and had 
closed about him, before he, with his wrists so tightly 
bound, could scramble to his feet. Fenced in, thus, ho 
felt himself hoisted to the top of a low flight of steps, 
and then for a moment he caught a glimpse of the fight- 
ing in the crowd and of a few' red coats sprinkled to- 
gether, here and there, struggling to rejoin their fellows. 


BARNABY KUDGE. 


37 


Next moment, everything was dark and gloomy, and he 
was standing in the prison lobby ; the centre of a group 
of men. 

A smith was speedily in attendance, who riveted upon 
him a set of heavy irons. Stumbling on as well as he 
could, beneath the unusual burden of these fetters, he 
was conducted to a strong stone cell, where, fastening the 
door with locks, and bolts, and chains, they left him, well 
secured ; having first, unseen by him, thrust in Grip, who, 
with his head drooping and his deep black plumes rough 
and rumpled, appeared to comprehend and to partake, 
bis master’s fallen fortunes. 





88 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


CHAPTER LIX. 

\ 

Ii is necessary at this juncture to return to Hugh, 
who, having, as we have seen, called to the rioters to 
disperse from about the Warren, and meet again as 
usual, glided back into the darkness from which he had 
emerged, and reappeared no more that night. 

He paused in the copse which sheltered him from the 
observation of his mad companions, and waited to ascer- 
tain whether they drew off at his bidding, or still lin- 
gered and called to him to join them. Some few, he 
saw, were indisposed to go away without him, and made 
towards the spot where he stood concealed as though 
they were about to follow in his footsteps, and urge him 
to come back ; but these men, being in their turn called 
to by their friends, and in truth not greatly caring to 
venture into the dark parts of the grounds, where they 
might be easily surprised and taken, if any of the neigh- 
bors or retainers of the family were watching them from 
among the trees, soon abandoned the idea, and hastily 
assembling such men as they found of their mkid at the 
moment, straggled off. 

When he was satisfied that the great mass of the in- 
surgents were imitating this example, and that the 
ground was rapidly clearing, he plunged into the thick- 
est portion of the little wood ; and crashing the branches 
as he went, made straight towards a distant light : guided 
by that, and by the sullen glow of the fire behind him. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


89 


As he drew nearer and nearer to the twinkling beacon 
towards which he bent his course, the red glare of a few 
torches began to reveal itself, and the voices of men 
speaking together in a subdued tone, broke the silence, 
which, save for a distant shouting now and then, already 
prevailed. At length he cleared the wood, and, spring- 
ing across a ditch, stood in a dark lane, where a small 
body of ill-looking vagabonds, whom he had left there 
some twenty minutes before, waited his .coming with im- 
patience. 

They were gathered round an old post-chaise oi 
chariot, driven by one of themselves, who sat postilion- 
wise upon the near horse. The blinds were drawn up, 
and Mr. Tappertit and Dennis kept guard at the two 
windows. The former assumed the command of the 
party, for he challenged Hugh as he advanced towards 
them ; and when he did so, those who were resting on 
the ground about the carriage rose to their feet and 
clustered round him. ? 

“ Well ! ” said Simon, in a low voice ; “ is all right ? ” 

“ Right enough,” replied Hugh, in the same tone. 
‘“They’re dispersing now — had begun before I came 
away.” 

“And is the coast clear?” 

“ Clear enough before our men, I take it,” said Hugh. 
“ There are not many who, knowing of their work over 
yonder, will want to meddle with ’em to-night. — Who’s 
got some drink here ? ” 

Everybody had some plunder from the cellar ; half a 
dozen flasks and bottles were offered directly. He se- 
lected the largest, and putting it to his mouth, sent the 
wine gurgling down his throat. Having emptied it, he 
threw it down, and stretched out his hand for another, 


40 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


which ho emptied likewise, at a draught. Another was 
• given him, and this he half emptied too. Reserving 
what remained, to finish with, he asked: — 

Have you got anything to eat, any of you ?, Tm as 
ravenous as a hungry wolf. Which of you was in the 
larder — come ? ” 

“ I was, brother,” said Dennis, pulling off his hat, and 
fumbling in the crown. “ There’s a matter of cold 
venison pasty somewhere or another here, if that’ll 
do?” 

“ Do ! ” cried Hugh, seating himself on the pathway. 
“ Bring it out ! Quick ! Show a light here, and gather 
round! Let me sup in state, my lads ! Ha, ha, ha !” 

Entering into his boisterous humor, for they all had 
drunk deeply, and were as wild as he, they crowded 
about him, while two of their number who had torches, 
held them up, one on either side of him, that his banquet 
might not be despatched in the dark. Mr. Dennis, hav- 
ing by this time succeeded in extricating from his hat a 
great mass of pasty, which had been wedged in so tightly 
that it was not easily got out, put it before him ; and 
Hugh, having borrowed a notched and jagged knife 
from one of the company, fell to work upon it vigor- 
ously. 

“I should recommend you to swallow a little fire 
every day, about an hour afore dinner, brother,” said 
Dennis, after a pause. “ It seems to agree with you, 
and to stimulate your appetite.” 

Hugh looked at him, and at the blackened faces by 
which he was surrounded, and, stopping for a moment 
to flourish his knife above his head, answered with a 
roar of laughter. 

“ Keep order there, will you ? ” said Simon Tappertit. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


41 


“ Why, isn’t a man allowed to regale himself, noble 
captain,” retorted his lieutenant, parting the men who 
stood between them, with his knife, that he might see 
him, — “ to regale himself a little bit, after such work 
as mine ? What a hard captain ! What a strict cap- 
tain ! What a tyrannical captain ! Ha, ha, ha ! ” 

I wish one of you fellers would hold a bottle to his 
mouth to keep him quiet,” said Simon, “ unless you want 
the military to be down upon us.” 

“ And what if they are down upon us ! ” retorted 
Hugh. “ Who cares ? Who’s afraid ? Let ’em come, 
I say, let ’em come. The more, the meiTier. Give me 
bold Barnaby at my side, and we two will settle the 
military, without troubling any of you. Barnaby’s the 
man for the military. Barnaby’s health ! ” 

But as the majority of those present were by no 
means anxious for a second engagement that night, 
being already weary and exhausted, they sided with 
Mr. Tappertit, and pressed him to make haste with his 
supper, for they had already delayed too long. Know- 
ing, even in the height of his frenzy, that they incurred 
great danger by lingering so near the scene of the late 
outrages, Hugh made an end of his meal without more 
remonstrance, and rising, stepped up to Mr. Tappertit 
and smote him on the back. 

“ Now then,” he cried, “ I’m ready. There are brave 
birds inside this cage, eh ? Delicate birds, — tender, 
loving, little doves. I caged ’em — I caged ’em — one 
more peep ! ” 

He thrust the little man aside as he spoke, and mount- 
ng on the steps which were half let down, pulled down 
the blind by force, and stared into the chaise like an ogre 
into his larder. 


42 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“Ha, ha, ha! and did you scratch, and pinch, and 
struggle, pretty mistress ? ” he cried, as he grasped a 
liUle hand that sought in vain to free itself from his 
grip: “you, so bright-eyed, and cherry-lipped, and 
daintily made ? But I love you better for it, mistress. 
Ay, I do. You should stab me and welcome, so that it 
pleased you, and you had to cure me afterwards. I 
love to see you proud and scornful. * It makes you hand- 
somer than ever ; and who so handsome as you at any 
time, my pretty one ! ” 

“ Come ! ” said Mr. Tappertit, who had waited during 
this speech with considerable impatience. “ There’s 
enough of that. Come down.” 

The little hand seconded this admonition by thrusting 
Hugh’s great head away with all its force, and drawing 
up the blind, amidst his noisy laughter, and vows that he 
must have another look, for the last glimpse of that 
sweet face had provoked him past all bearing. How- 
ever, as the suppressed impatience of the party now 
broke out into open murmurs, he abandoned this design, 
and taking his seat upon the bar, contented himself with 
tapping at the front windows of the carriage, and trying 
to steal a glance inside ; Mr. Tappertit mounting the 
steps and hanging on by the door, issued his directions 
to the driver with a commanding voice and attitude ; the 
rest got up behind, or ran by the side of the carriage, as 
they could ; some, in imitation of Hugh, endeavored to 
see the face he had praised so highly, and were reminded 
of their impertinence by hints from the cudgel of Mr. 
Tappertit. Thus they pursued their journey by circui 
tons and winding roads ; preserving, except when they 
halted to take breath, or to quarrel about the best way of 
reaching London, pretty good order and tolerable silence. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


43 


In the mean time, Dolly — beautiful, bewitching, cap- 
tivating little Dolly — her hair dishevelled, her dress 
torn, her dark eyelashes wet with tears, her bosom heav- 
ing — her face, now pale with fear, now crimsoned with 
indignation — her whole self a hundred times more beau- 
tiful in this heightened ^^^pect than ever she had been 
before — vainly strove to comfort Emma Haredale, and 
to impart to her the consolation of which she stood in so 
much need herself. The soldiers were sure to come; 
they must be rescued ; it would be impossible to convey 
them through the streets of London, when they set the 
threats of their guards at defiance, and shrieked to the 
passengers for help. If they did this, when they came 
into the more frequented ways, she was certain — she 
was quite certain — they must be released. So poor 
Dolly said, and so poor Dolly tried to think ; but the 
invariable conclusion of all such arguments was, that 
Dolly burst into tears ; cried, as she wrung her hands, 
what would they do or think, or who would comfort 
them, at home, at the Golden Key; and sobbed most 
piteously. 

Miss Haredale, whose feelings were usually of a 
quieter kind than Dolly’s, and not so much upon the 
surface, was dreadfully alarmed, and indeed had only 
just recovered from a swoon. She was very pale, and 
the hand which Dolly held was quite cold ; but she bade 
her, nevertheless, remember that, under Providence, 
much jnust depend upon their own discretion ; that if 
they remained quiet and lulled the vigilance of the 
ruffians into whose hands they had fallen, the chances 
of their being able to procure assistance when they 
reached the town, were very much increased ; that un- 
less society were quite unhinged, a hot pursuit must be 


i4 


BARNABY RUDGE, 


immediately commenced ; and that her uncle, she might 
be sure, would never rest until he had found them out 
and rescued them. But as she said these latter words, 
the idea that he had fallen in a general massacre of the 
Catholics that night — no Very wild or improbable sup- 
position, after what they had seen and undergone — 
struck her dumb ; and, lost' i? the horrors they had 
witnessed, and those they might be yet reserved for, 
she sat incapable of thought, or speech, or outward 
show of grief: as rigid, and almost as white and cold, 
as marble. 

Oh, how many many times, in that long ride, did Dolly 
think of her old lover — poor, fond, slighted Joe ! How 
many, many times, did she recall that night when she 
ran into his arms from the very man now projecting his 
hateful gaze into the darkness where she sat, and leering 
through the glass, in monstrous admiration ! And when 
she thought of Joe, and what a brave fellow he was, and 
how he would have rode boldly up, and dashed in among 
these villains now, yes, though they were double the 
number — and here she clinched her little hand, and 
pressed her foot upon the ground — the pride she felt 
for a moment in having won his heart, faded in a burst 
of tears, and she sobbed more bitterly than ever. 

As the night wore on, and they proceeded by ways 
which were quite unknown to them — for they could 
recognize none of the objects of which they sometimes 
caught a hurried glimpse — their fears increased; nor 
were they without good foundation ; it was not difficult 
for two beautiful young women to find, in their being 
borne they knew not whither, by a band of daring vil- 
lains who eyed them as some among these fellows did, 
reasons for the worst alarm. When they at last entered 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


45 


London by a suburb with which they were wholly un- 
acquainted, it was past midnight, and the streets were 
dark and empty. Nor was this the worst, for the car- 
riage stopping in a lonely spot, Hugli suddenly opened 
the door, jumped in, and took his seat between them. 

It was in vain they cried for help. He put his arm 
about the neck of each, and swore to stifle them with 
kisses if they were not as silent as the grave. 

“ I come here to keep you quiet,” he said, “ and 
that’s the means I shall take. So don’t be quiet, 
pretty mistresses — make a noise — do — and I shall 
like it all the better.” 

They were proceeding at a rapid pace, and apparently 
with fewer attendants than before, though it was so dark 
(the torches being extinguished) that this was mere con- 
jecture. They shrunk from his touch, each into the 
farthest corner of the carriage ; but shrink as Dolly 
would, his arm encircled her waist, and held her fast. 
She neither cried nor spoke, for terror and disgust de- 
prived her of the power ; but she plucked at his hand as 
though she would die in the effort to disengage herself ; 
and crouching on the ground, with her head averted 
and held down, repelled him with a strength she won- 
dered at as much as he. The carriage stopped again. 

“ Lift this one out,” said Hugh to the man who 
opened the door, as he took Miss Haredale’s hand, 
and felt how heavily it fell. “ She’s fainted.” 

“ So much the better,” growled Dennis — it was that 
amiable gentleman. “ She’s quiet. I always like ’em 
to faint, unless they’re very tender and composed.” 

“ Can you take her by yourself? ” asked Hugh. . 

“ I don’t know till I try. I ought to be able to ; I’ve 
lifted up a good many in ray time,” said the hangman. 


46 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ Up then ! * She’s no small weight, brother ; none of 
these here fine gals are. Up again ! Now we have 
her.” 

Having by this time hoisted the young lady into his 
arms, he staggered off with his burden. 

“ Look ye, pretty bird,” said Hugh, drawing Dolly tow- 
ards him. ‘‘ Remember what I told you — a kiss for 
every cry. Scream, if you love me, darling. Scream 
once, mistress. Pretty mistress, only once, if you love 
me.” 

Thrusting his face away with all her force, and hold- 
ing down her head, Dolly submitted to be carried out of 
the chaise, and borne after Miss Haredale into a miser- 
able cottage, where Hugh, after hugging her to his 
breast, set her gently down upon the floor. 

Poor Dolly ! do what she would, she only looked the 
better for it, and tempted them the more. When her 
eyes flashed angrily, and her ripe lips slightly parted, 
to give her rapid breathing vent, who could resist it? 
When she wept and sobbed as though her heart would 
break, and bemoaned her miseries in the sweetest voice 
that ever fell upon a listener’s ear, who could be insensi- 
ble to the little winning pettishness which now and then 
displayed itself even in the sincerity and earnestness of 
her grief? When, forgetful for a moment of herself, as 
she was now, she fell on her knees beside her friend, and 
bent over her, and laid her cheek to hers, and put her 
inns about her, what mortal eyes could have avoided 
wandering to the delicate bodice, the streaming hair, the 
neglected dress, the perfect abandonment and uncon- 
sciousness of the blooming little beauty ? Who could 
look on and see her lavish caresses and endearments, 
and not desire to be in Emma Haredale’s place ; to 


BARNAJBY RUDGE. 


47 


be either her or Dolly ; either the hugging or the 
hugged ? Not Hugh. Not Dennis. 

“ I tell you what it is, young women,” said Mr 
Dennis, “I aVt much of a lady’s man myself, nor 
am I a party in the present business further than 
lending a willing hand to my friends : but if I see 
much more of this here sort of thing, I shall become 
a principal instead of a accessory. I tell you candid.’* 
“ Why have you brought us here ? ” said Emma. 
‘ Are we to be murdered ? ^ 

“ Murdered ! ” cried Dennis, sitting down upon a 
stool, and regarding her with great favor. “ Why, my 
dear, who’d murder sich chickabiddies as you ? If you 
was to ask me, now, whether you was brought here to 
be married, there might be something in it.” 

And here he exchanged a grin with Hugh, who re- 
moved his eyes from Dolly for the purpose. 

“ No, no,” said Dennis, “.there’ll be no murdering, 
my pets. Nothing of that sort. Quite the contrairy.” 

“ You are an older man than your companion, sir,” 
said Emma, trembling. “ Have you no pity for us ? 
Do you not consider that we are women ? ” 

“ 1 do indeed, my dear,” retorted Dennis. “ It would 
be very hard not to, with two such specimens afore my 
eyes. Ha, ha ! Oh yes, I consider that. We all con- 
sider that, miss.” 

He shook his head waggishly, leered at Hugh again, 
and laughed very much, as if he had said a ncble thing, 
and rather thought he was coming out. 

“ There’ll be no murdering, my dear. Not a bit on it. 
I tell you what though, brother,” said Dennis, cocking 
his hat for the convenience of scratching his head, and 
looking gravely at Hugh, “it’s worthy of notice, as a 


48 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


proof of the amazing equalness and dignity of our law, 
that it don’t make no distinction between men and 
women. I’ve heerd the judge say, sometimes to a high- 
wayman or house-breaker as had tied the ladies neck and 
heels — you’ll excuse me making mention of it, my dar- 
lings — and put ’em in a cellar, that he showed no con- 
sideration to women. Now, I say that there judge didn’t 
know his business, brother ; and that if I had been that 
there highwayman or house-breaker, I should have made 
answer : ‘ What are you a-t#lking of, my lord ? I showed 
the women as much consideration as the law does, and 
what more would you have me do ? ’ If you was to count 
up in the newspapers the number of females as have 
been worked off in this here city alone, in the last ten 
year,” said Mr. Dennis thoughtfully, “ you’d be sur- 
prised at the total — quite amazed, you would. There’s 
a dignified and equal thing; a beautiful thing! But 
we’ve no security for its* lasting. Now that they’ve 
begun to favor these here Papists, I shouldn’t wonder 
if they went and altered even that, one of these days. 
Upon my soul, I shouldn’t.” 

This subject, perhaps from being of too exclusive and 
professional a nature, failed to interest Hugh as much 
as his friend had anticipated. '^But he had no time to 
pursue it, for at this crisis, Mr. Tappertit entered pre- 
cipitately ; at siglit of whom Dolly uttered a scream of 
joy, and fairly threw herself into his arms. 

“ I knew it, I was sure of it ! ” cried Dolly. “ My 
dear father’s at the door. Thank God, thank God I 
Bless you, Sim. Heaven bless you for this ! ” 

Simon Tappertit, who had at first implicitly believed 
that the locksmith’s daughter, unable any longer to sup- 
press her secret passion for himself, was about to give 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


49 


it full vent in its intensity, and to declare that she was 
his forever, looked extremely foolish when she said 
these words ; — the more so, as they were received by 
Hugh and Dennis with a loud laugh, which made her 
draw back, and regard him with a fixed and earnest 
jook. 

“ Miss Haredale,” said Sim, after a very awkward 
silence, “ I hope you’re as comfortable as circumstances 
will permit of. Dolly Varden, my darling — my own, 
my lovely one — I hope yoiCre pretty comfortbale like- 
wise.” 

Poor little Dolly ! She saw how it was ; hid her 
face in her hands ; and sobbed more bitterly than 
ever. 

You meet in me. Miss V.,” said Simon, laying his 
hand upon his breast, “ not a ’prentice, not a workman, 
not a slave, not the wictim of your father’s tyrannical 
behavior, but the leader of a great people, the captain 
of a noble band, in which these gentlemen are, as I may 
say, corporals and sergeants. You behold in me, not a 
private individual, but a public character ; not a mender 
of locks, but a healer of the wounds of his unhappy 
country. Dolly V., sweet Dolly V., for how many years 
have I looked forward to this present meeting ! For 
how many years has it been my intention to exalt and 
ennoble you ! I redeem it. Behold in me, your hus- 
band. Yes, beautiful Dolly — charmer — enslaver — S. 
Tappertit is all your own ! ” 

As he said these words he advap^ed towards her. 
Dolly retreated till she could go no farther, and then 
<ank down upon the floor. Thinking it very possible 
that this might be maiden modesty, Simon essayed to 
raise her ; on which Dolly, goaded to desperation, wound 

VOL. III. 4 


50 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


her hands in his hair, and crying out amidst her tears 
that he was a dreadful little wretch, and always had 
been, shook, and pulled, and beat him, until he was fain 
to call for help, most lustily. Hugh had never admired 
her half so much as at that moment. 

“ She’s in an excited state to-night,” said Simon, as 
he smoothed his rumpled feathers, “ and don’t know 
when she’s well off. Let her be by herself till to-mor- 
row, and that’ll bring her down a little. Carry her into 
the next house ! ” 

Hugh had her in his arms directly. It might be 
tliat Mr. Tappertit’s heart was really softened by her 
distress, or it might be that he felt it in some degree 
indecorous that his intended bride should be struggling 
in the grasp of another man. He commanded him, 
on second thoughts, to put her down again, and looked 
moodily on as she flew to Miss Haredale’s side, and 
clinging to her dress, hid her flushed face in its folds. 

“ They shall remain here together till to-morrow,” said 
Simon, who had now quite recovered his dignity — till 
to-morrow. ' Come away ! ” 

“ Ay ! ” cried Hugh. “ Come away, captain. Ha, ha, 
ha ! ” 

“ What are you laughing at ? ” demanded Simon 
sternly. 

‘‘ Nothing, captain, nothing,” Hugh rejoined ; and as 
he spoke, and clapped his hand upon the shoulder of the 
little man, he laughed again, for some unknown reason, 
with tenfold violei^ce. 

Mr. Tappertit surveyed him from head to foot with 
lofty scorn (this only made him laugh the more), and 
turning to the prisoners, said : — 

“ You’ll take notice ladies, that this place is well 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


51 


watched on ev^ery side, and that the least noise is cer- 
tain to be attended with unpleasant consequences. You’ll 
hear — both of you — more of our intentions to-mor^ 
row. In the mean time, don’t show yourselves at the 
window, or appeal to any of the people you may see 
pass it; for if you do, it’ll be known directly that you 
come from a Catholic house, and all the exertions our 
men can make, may not be able to save your lives.” 

With this last caution, which was true enoughp he 
turned to the door, followed by Hugh and Dennis. They 
paused for a moment, going out, to look at them clasped 
in each other’s arms, and then left the cottage ; fastening 
the door, and setting a good watch upon it, and indeed 
all round the house. 

‘‘ I say,” growled Dennis, as they walked away it 
company, “that’s a dainty pair. Muster Gashford’s' one 
is as handsome as the other, eh ? ” ' 

“ Hush ! ” said Hugh, hastily. “ Don’t you mention 
names. It’s a bad habit.” 

“ I wouldn’t like to be him, then (as you don’t like 
names), when he breaks it out to her ; that’s all,” said 
Dennis. “ She’s one of them fine, black-eyed, proud 
gals, as I wouldn’t trust at such times with a knife too 
near ’em. I’ve seen some of that sort, afore now. I 
recollect one that was worked off, many year ago — and 
there *i^as a gentleman in that case too — that says to 
me, with her lip a-trembling, but her hand as steady as 
ever I see one ; ‘ Dennis, I’m near my end, but if I had 
a dagger in these fingers, and he was within my reach. 
I’d strike him dead afore me ; ’ — ah, she did — and 
ihe’d have done it too ! ” 

“ Strike who dead ? ” demanded Hugh. 

“ How should I know, brother ? ” answered Dennis, 
“ She never said ; not she.” 


52 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Hugh looked, for a moment, as though he would have 
made some further inquiry into this incoherent recollec- 
tion ; but Simon Tappertit, who had been meditating 
deeply, gave his thoughts a new direction. 

“ Hugh ! ” said Sim. “ You have done well to-day 
You shall be rewarded. So have you, Dennis. — There’s 
lo young woman you want to carry off, is there ? ” 

“ N — no,” returned that gentleman, stroking his griz- 
zled beard, which was some two inches long. “ None in 
partickler, I think.” 

“ Very good,” said Sim ; “ then we’ll find some other 
way of making it up to you. As to you, old boy ” — he 
turned to Hugh — “ you shall have Miggs (her that I 
promised you, you know) within three days. Mind, I 
pass my word for it.” 

Hugh thanked him heartily; and as he did so, his 
laughing fit returned with such violence that he was 
obliged to hold his side with one hand, and to lean with 
the other on the shoulder of his small captain, without 
whose support he would certainly have rolled upon the 
ground. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


53 


CHAPTER LX. 

The three worthies turned their faces towards The 
Boot, with the intention of passing the night in that 
place of rendezvous, and of seeking the repose they so 
much needed in the shelter of their old den ; for now 
that the mischief and destruction they had purposed 
were achieved, and their prisoners were safely bestowed 
for the night, they began to be conscious of exhaustion, 
and to feel the wasting effects of the madness which had 
led to such deplorable results. 

Notwithstanding the lassitude and fatigue which op- 
pressed him now, in common with his two companions, 
and indeed with all who had taken an active share in 
that night’s work, Hugh’s boisterous merriment broke 
out afresh whenever he looked at Simon Tappertit, and 
vented itself — much to that gentleman’s indignation — 
in such shouts of laughter as bade fair to bring the 
watch upon them, and involve them in a skirmish, to 
which in their present worn-out condition they might 
prove by no means equal. Even Mr. Dennis, who was 
not at all particular on the score of gravity or dignity, 
and who had a great relish for his young friend’s eccen- 
tric humors, took occasion to remonstrate with him on 
this imprudent behavior, which he held to be a species 
of suicide, tantamount to a man’s working himself off 
without being overtaken by the law, than which he could 
imagine nothing more ridiculous or impertinent. 


o4 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Not abating one jot of his noisy mirth for these re- 
monstrances, Hugh reeled along between them, having 
an arm of each, until they hove in sight of The Boot, 
and were within a field or two of that convenient tavern. 
He happened by great good luck to have roared and 
shouted himself into silence by this time. They were 
proceeding onward without noise, when a scout who had 
been creeping about the ditches all night, to warn any 
stragglers Trom encroaching farther on what was now 
such dangerous ground, peeped cautiously from his hid- 
ing-place, and called to them to stop. 

“Stop! and why?” said Hugh. » 

Because (the scout replied) the house was filled with 
constables and soldiers; having been surprised that after- 
noon. The inmates had fled or been taken into custody, 
he could not say which. He had iprevented a great many 
people from approaching nearer, and he believed they 
had ^gone to the markets and such places to pass the 
night. He had seen the distant fires, but they were all 
out. now.; He had heard the people who- passed and 
repassed, speaking of them too, and could report that the 
prevailing opinion was one of apprehension -and dismay. 
He had not heard a word of Barnaby — didn’t even 
know his name — but it had been said in his hearing 
that some man .had been taken and carried off to New- 
gate. Whether this was true or false he could not affirm. 

The three took counsel together, on hearing this, and 
debated what it might be best to do. Hugh, deeming it 
possible that Barnaby was in the hands of the soldiers, 
and at that moment under detention at The Boot, was 
for advancing stealthily, and firing the house ; but his 
companions, who objected to such rash measures unless 
they had a crowd at their backs, represented that if Bar- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


55 


naby were taken he had assuredly been removed to a 
stronger prison ; they would never have dreamed, he 
said, of keeping him all night in a place so weak and 
open to attack. Yielding to this reasoning, and to their 
persuasions, Hugh consented to turn back, and to repair 
to Fleet Market ; for which place, it seemed, a few of 
their boldest associates had shaped their course, on re- 
ceiving the same intelligence. 

Feeling their strength recruited and their Spirits 
roused, now that there was a new necessity for action, 
they hurried away, quite forgetful of the fatigue under 
which they had been sinking but a few minutes before; 
and soon arrived at their place of destination. 

Fleet Market, at that time, was a long irregular row of 
wooden sheds and pent-houses, occupying the centre of 
what is now called Farringdon Street. They were 
jumbled together in a most unsightly fashion, in the 
middle of the road; to the great obstruction of the 
thoroughfare and the annoyance of passengers, who 
were fain to make their way, as they best could, 
among carts, baskets, barrows, trucks, casks, bulks, and 
benches, and to jostle with porters, hucksters, wagoners, 
and a motley crowd of buyers, sellers, pickpockets, va- 
grants, and idlers. The air was perfumed with the 
stench of rotten leaves and faded fruit ; the refuse of 
the butchers’ stalls, and offal and garbage of a hundred 
kinds. It was indispensable to most public conveniences 
in those days, that they should be public nuisances like- 
wise ; and Fleet Market maintained the principle to 
admiration. 

To this place, perhaps because its sheds and baskets 
,vere a tolerable substitute for beds, or perhaps because it 
afforded the means of a hasty barricade in case of need, 


56 BARNABY RUDGE. 

many of the rioters had straggled not only that nighty 
but for two or three nights before. It was now broad 
day, but the morning being cold, a group of them were 
gathered round a fire in a public-house, drinking hot purl, 
and smoking pipes, and planning new schemes for to- 
morrow. 

Hugh and his two friends being knowm to most of 
these men, were received with signal marks of approba- 
tion, and inducted into the most honorable seats. The 
room-door was closed and fastened to keep intruders at 
a distance, and then they proceeded to exchange news. 

“ The soldiers have taken possession of The Boot, I 
hear,” said Hugh. “ Who knows anything about it ? ” 

Several cried that they did ; but the majority of the 
company having been engaged in the assault upon the 
Warren, and all present having been concerned in one 
or other of the night’s expeditions, it proved that they 
knew no more than Hugh himself ; having been merely 
warned by each other, or by the scout, and knowing 
nothing of their own knowledge. 

“We left a man on guard there to-day,” said Hugh, 
looking round him, “ who is not here.” You know 
who it is — Barnaby, who brought the soldier down, at 
Westminster. Has any man seen or heard of him ? ” 

They shook their heads, and murmured an answer in 
the negative, as each man looked round and appealed to 
his fellow ; wlien a noise was heard without, and a man 
was heard to say that he w^anted Hugh — that he must 
6ee Hugh. 

“ He is but one man,” cried Hugh to those who kept 
the door ; “ let him come in.” 

“ Ay, ay ! ” muttered the others. “ Let him come in. 
Let him come in.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


57 


The door was accordingly unlocked and opened. A 
one-armed man, with his head and face tied up with a 
bloody cloth as though he had been severely beaten, his 
clothes torn, and his remaining hand grasping a thick 
stick, rushed in among them, and panting for breathy 
demanded which was Hugh. 

“ Here he is,” replied the person he inquired for. “ I 
am Hugh. What do you want with me ? ” 

“ I have a message for you,” said the man. You 
know one Barnaby.” 

“ What of him ? Did he send the message ? ” 

“ Yes. He’s taken. He’s in one of the strong cells 
in Newgate. He defended himself as well as he could, 
but was overpowered by numbers. That’s his mes- 
sage.” 

“ When did you see him ? ” asked Hugh, hastily. 

“ On his way to prison, where he was taken by a party 
of soldiers. They took a by-road, and not the one we 
expected. I was one of the few who tried to rescue 
him, and he called to me, and told me to tell Hugh 
where he was. We made a good struggle, though it 
failed. Look here ! ” 

He pointed to his dress and to his bandaged head, and 
still panting for breath, glanced round the rpom : then 
faced towards Hugh again. 

“ I know you by sight,” he said, “ for I was in the 
crowd on Friday, and on Saturday, and yesterday, but 
I didn’t know your name. You’re a bold fellow, I know 
So is he. Pie fought like a lion to-night, but it was of 
no use. I did my best, considering that I want thig 
limb.” 

Again he glanced inquisitively round the room — or 
seemed to do so, for Pis face was nearly hidden by the 


58 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


bandage — and again facing sharply towards' Hugh, 
grasped his stick as if he half expected to be set upon, 
and stood on the defensive. 

If he had any such apprehension, however, he was 
speedily reassured by the demeanor of all present. 
None thought of the bearer of the tidings. He was 
lost in the news he brought. Oaths, threats, and ex- 
ecrations were vented on all sides. Some cried that 
if they bore this tamely, another day would see them 
all in jail ; some, that they should have rescued the 
other prisoners, and this would not have happened. 
One man cried in a loud voice, “ Who’ll follow me to 
Newgate ! ” and there was a loud shout and a general 
rush towards the door. 

But Hugh and Dennis stood with their backs against 
it, and kept them back, until the clamor had so far sub- 
sided that their voices could be heard, when they called 
to them together that to go now, in broad day, would be 
madness ; and that if they waited until night and ar- 
ranged a plan of attack, they might release, not only 
their own companions, but all the prisoners, and burn 
down the jail. 

“Not that jail alone,” cried Hugh, “but every jail 
in London. They shall have no place to put their 
prisoners in. We’ll burn them all down ; make bon- 
fires of them every one ! Here ! ” he cried, catching 
at the hangman’s hand. “ Let all who’re men here 
join with us. Shake hands upon it. Barnaby out of 
jail, and not a jail left standing ! Who joins ? ” 

Every man there. And they swore a great oath to 
release their friends from Newgate next night ; to force 
the doors and burn the jail ; or perish in the fire them- 
Belves. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


59 


CHAPTji!.B LXL 

On that same night — events so crowd upon each 
other in convulsed and distracted times, that more than 
the stirring incidents of a whole life often become com- 
pressed into the compass of four-and-twenty hours — on 
that same night, Mr. Haredale, having strongly bound 
his prisoner, with the assistance of the sexton, and forced 
him to mount his horse, conducted him to Chigwell; 
bent upon procuring a conveyance to London from that 
place, and carrying him at once before a Justice. The 
disturbed state of the town would be, he knew, a suffi- 
cient reason for demanding the murderer’s committal to 
prison before daybreak, as no man could answer for the 
security of any of the watch-houses or ordinary places of 
detention ; and to convey a prisoner through the streets 
when the mob were again abroad, would not only be a 
task of great danger and hazard, but would be to chal- 
lenge an attempt at rescue. Directing the sexton to 
lead the horse, he walked close by the murderer’s side, 
and in this order they reached the village about the mid- 
dle of the night. 

The people were all awake and up, for they were fear- 
ful of being burnt in their beds, and sought to comfort 
and assure each other by watching in company. A few 
of the stoutest-hearted were armed and gathered in a 
body on the green. To these who knew him well, Mr. 
Haredale addressed himself, briefly narrating what had 


6C 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


happened, and beseeching them to aid in conveying the 
criminal to London before the dawn of day. 

Blit not a man among them dared to help him by so 
much as the motion of a finger. The rioters, in their 
passage through the village, had menaced with their 
fiercest vengeance any person who should aid in extin- 
guishing the fire, or render the least assistance to him, 
or any catholic whomsoever. Their threats extended to 
their lives and all that they possessed. They were as- 
sembled for their own protection, and could not endanger 
themselves by lending any aid to him. This they told 
him, not without hesitation and regret, as they kept aloof 
in the moonlight and glanced fearfully at the ghostly 
rider, who, with his head drooping on his breast and his 
hat slouched down upon his brow, neither moved nor 
spoke. 

Finding it impossible to persuade them, and indeed 
hardly knowing how to do so after what they had seen 
of the fury of the crowd, Mr. Haredale besought them 
that at least they would leave him free to act for himself, 
and would suffer him to take the only chaise and pair of 
horses that the place afforded. This was not acceded to 
without some difficulty, but in the end they told him to 
do what he would, and go away, from them in Heaven’s 
name. 

Leaving the sexton at the horse’s bridle, he drew out 
the chaise with his own hands, and would have harnessed 
the horses, but that the post-boy of the village — a soft- 
hearted, good-for-nothing, vagabond kind of fellow — 
was moved by his earnestness and passion, and, throwing 
down a pitchfork with which he was armed, swore that 
the rioters might cut him into mince-meat if they liked, 
but he would not stand by and see an honest gentleman 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


61 


who bad done no -wrong, reduced to such extfemity, 
without doing what he could to help him. Mr. Hare- 
dale shook him warmly by the hand, and thanked him 
from his heart. In five minutes’ time the chaise was 
’-eady, and this good scapegrace in his saddle. The mur- 
derer was put inside, the blinds were drawn up, the sex- 
ton took his seat upon the bar, Mr. Haredale mounted 
his horse and rode close beside the door ; and so they 
started in the dead of night, and in profound silence, for 
London. 

The consternation was so extreme that even the horses 
which had escaped the flames at the Warren, could find 
no friends to shelter them. They passed them on the 
road, browzing on the stunted grass ; and the driver told 
them, that the poor beasts had wandered to the village 
first, but had been driven away lest they should bring 
the vengeance of the crowd on any of the inhabitants. 

Nor was this feeling confined to such small places, 
w-here the people were timid, ignorant, and unprotected. 
When they came near London they met in the gray 
light of morning, more than one poor catholic family 
who, terrified by the threats and warnings of their 
neighbors, were quitting the city on foot, and who told 
them they could hire no cart or horse for the removal of 
their goods, and had been compelled to leave them be- 
hind, at the mercy of the crowd. Near Mile-end they 
passed a house, the master of which, a catholic gentle- 
jnan of small means, havirtg hired a wagon to remove 
his furniture by midnight, had had it all brought down 
into the street to wait the vehicle’s arrival, and save time 
in the packing. But the man with whom he made 
the bargain, alarmed by the fires that night, and by the 
Bight of the rioters passing his door, had refused to keep 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


■ G2 

it : and the poor gentleman, with his wife and servant 
and their little children, were sitting trembling among 
their goods in the open street, dreading the arrival of 
day, and not knowing where to turn or what to do. 

It was the same, they heard, with the public convey- 
ances. The panic was so great that the mails and stage- 
coaches were afraid to carry passengers who professed 
the obnoxious religion. If the drivers knew them, or 
they admitted that they held that creed, they would not 
take them, no, though they offered large sums ; and yes- 
terday, people had been afraid to recognize catholic ac- 
quaintance in the streets, lest they should be marked by 
spies, and burnt out, as it was called, in consequence. 
One mild old man — a priest, whose chapel was de- 
stroyed ; a very feeble, patient, inoffensive creature — 
who was trudging away, alone, designing to walk some 
distance from town, and then try his fortune with the 
coaches, told Mr. Haredale that he feared he might not 
find a magistrate who would have the hardihood to com- 
mit a prisoner to jail, on his complaint. But notwith- 
standing these discouraging accounts they went on, and 
reached the Mansion House soon after sunrise. 

Mr. Haredale threw himself from his horse, but he 
had no need to knock at the door, for it was already 
open, and there stood upon the step a portly old man, 
with a very red, or rather purple face, who with an anx- 
ious expression of countenance, was remonstrating with 
some unseen person up-stairs,’ while the porter essayed • 
to close the door by degrees and get rid of him. With 
the intense impatience and excitement natural to one in 
his condition, Mr. Haredale thrust himself forward and 
was about to speak, when the fat old gentleman inter- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


63 


“My good sir,” said he, “pray let me get an answer. 
This is the sixth time I have been here. I was here 
five times yesterday. My house is threatened with de- 
struction. It IS to be burned down to-night, and was to 
have been last night, but they had other business on 
their hands. Pray let me get an answer.” 

“ My good sir,” returned Mr. Haredale, shaking his 
head, “ my house is burned to the ground. But Heaven 
forbid that yours should be. Get your answer. Be 
brief, in mercy to me.” 

“ Now, you hear- this, my lord ? ” — said the old gen- 
tleman, calling up the stairs, to where the skirt of a 
dressing-gown fluttered on the landing-place. “ Here is 
a gentleman here, whose house was actually burnt down 
last night.” 

“ Dear me, dear me,” replied a testy voice, “ I am 
very sorry for it, but what am I to do ? I can’t build it 
up again. The chief magistrate of the city can’t go and 
be a-rebuilding of people’s houses, my good sir. Stuff 
and nonsense ! ” 

But the chief ‘ magistrate of the city can prevent 
people’s houses from having any need to be rebuilt, if 
the chief magistrate’s a man, and not a dummy — can’t 
he, my lord?” cried the old gentleman in a choleric 
manner. 

“ You are disrespectable, sir,” said the Lord Mayor — 

“ leastways, disrespectful I mean.” 

“ Disrespectful, my lord !” returned the old gentleman 
“ I was respectful five times yesterday. I can’t be re- 
spectful forever. . Men can’t stand on being respectful 
when their houses are going to be burnt over their heads, * 
with them in ’em. What am I to do, my lord? Am 1 
to have any protection ! ” 


64 


BARNABY KUDGE. 


“I told jou yesterday, sir,” said fno Lord Mj.yor, 
“ that you might have an alderman in your house, if you 
could get one to come.” 

“ What the devil’s the good of an alderman ? ” re 
turned the choleric old gentleman. * 

“ — To awe the crowd, sir,” said the Lord Mayor. 

‘‘ Oh Lord ha’ mercy !” whimpered the old gentleman, 
as he wiped his forehead in a state of ludicrous distress, 
“ to think of sending an alderman to awe a crowd ! 
Why, my lord, if they were even so many babies, fed on 
mother’s milk, what do you think they’d care for an al- 
derman ! Will you come ? ” 

“ I ! ” said the Lord Mayor, most emphatically : “ Cer- 
tainly not.” 

■ “ Then what,” returned the old gentleman, “ what am 
1 to do ? Am I a citizen of England ? Am I to have 
the benefit of the laws ? Am I to have any return for 
the King’s taxes ? ” 

“ I don’t know, I am sure,” said the Lord Mayor ; 
“ what a pity it is you’re a catholic ! Why couldn’t you 
be a protestant, and then you wouldn’t have got yourself 
into such a mess ? I’m sure I don’t know what’s to be 
done. — There are great people at the bottom of these 
riots. — Oh dear me, what a thing it is to be a public 
character ! — You must look in again in the course of 
the day. — Would a javelin-man do? — Or there’s Philips 
the constable, — he's disengaged, — he’s not very old for 
a man at his time of life, except in his legs, and if you 
put him up at a window he’d look quite young by candle- 
light, and might frighten ’em very much. — Oh dear ! — 
* well, — we’ll see about it.” 

“ Stop ! ” cried Mr. Haredale, pressing the door open 
as the porter strove to shut it, and speaking rapidly 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


65 


“ My Lord Mayor, I beg you not to go away. I have a 
man here, who committed a murder eight-and-twenty 
years ago. Half a dozen words from me, on oath, will 
justify you in committing him to prison, for reexamina- 
tion. I only seek, just now^to have him consigned to a 
place of safety. The least delay may involve his being 
rescued by the rioters.” 

“ Oh dear me ! ” cried the Lord Mayor. “ God bless 
my soul — and body — oh Lor ! — well I ! — there are 
great people at the bottom of these riots, you know. — 
You really mustn’t.” 

“ My lord,” said Mr. Haredale, the murdered gentle- 
man was my brother ; I succeeded to his inheritance ; 
there were not wanting slanderous tongues at that time, 
to whisper that the guilt of this most foul and cruel 
deed was mine — mine, who loved him, as he knows, in 
Heaven, dearly. The time has come, after all these 
years of gloom and misery, for avenging him, and bring- 
ing to light a crime so artful and so devilish that it has 
no parallel. Every second’s delay on your part loosens 
tliis man’s bloody hands again, and leads to his escape. 
My lord, I charge you hear me, and despatch this matter 
on the instant.” 

“ Oh dear me ! ” cried the chief magistrate ; “ these 
a’n’t business hours, you know — I wonder at you — 
how ungentlemanly it is of you — you mustn’t — you 
really mustn’t. — And I suppose you are a catholic 
too ? ” 

j “I am,” said Mr. Haredale. 

“ God bless my soul, I believe people turn catholics a’ 
purpose to vex and worrit me,” cried the Lord Mayor. 
“ I wish you wouldn’t come here ; they’ll be setting the 
Mansion House afire next, and we shall have you to 

VOL. lU 6 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


6G 

thank for it. You must lock your prisoner up, sir — 
give him to a watchman — and — and call again at a 
proper time. Then we’ll see about it ! ’* 

Before Mr. Haredale could answer, the sharp closing 
of a door and drawing of its bolts, gave notice that the 
Lord Mayor had retreated to his bedroom, and that 
further remonstrance would be unavailing. The two 
clients retreated likewise, and the porter shut them out 
into the street. 

“ That’s the way he puts me off,” said the old gentle- 
man, “ I can get no redress and no help. What are you 
going to do, sir ? ” ■ * 

“ To try elsewhere,” answered Mr. Haredale, who was 
by this time on horseback. 

“ I feel for you, I assure you — and well I may, for 
we are in a common cause,” said the old gentleman. “ I 
may not have a house to offer you to-night ; let me ten- 
der it while I can. On second thoughts though,” he 
added, putting up a pocket-book he had produced while 
speaking, “ I’ll not give you a card, for if it was found 
upon you, it might get you into trouble. Langdale — 
that’s my name — vintner and distiller — Holborn Hill 
— you’re heartily welcome, if you’ll come.” 

Mr. Haredale bowed, and rode off, close beside the 
chaise as before ; determining to repair to the house of 
Sir John Fielding, who had the reputation of being a 
bold and active magistrate, and fully resolved, in case 
the rioters should come upon them, to do execution on 
the murderer with his own hands, rather than suffer him 
to be released. 

They arrived at the magistrate’s dwelling, however, 
without molestation (for the mob, as we have seen, were 
then intent on deeper schemes), and knocked at the 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


67 


door. As it had been pretty generally rumored that Sir 
John was proscribed by the rioters, a body’ of thief- 
takers had been keeping watch in the house all night. 
To one of,jthem, Mr. Haredale stated his business, which 
appearing to the man of sufficient moment , to warrant 
his arousing the justice, procured him an immediate 
audience. 

No time was lost in committing the murderer to New- 
gate ; then a new building, recently completed at a vast 
expense, and considered to be of enormous strength. 
The warrant being made out, three of the thief-takers 
bound him afresh (he had been struggling, it seemed, in 
the chaise, and had loosened his manacles) ; gagged him 
lest they should meet with any of the mob, and he should 
call to them for help ; and seated themselves along with 
him in the carriage. These men being all well armed, 
made a formidable escort ; but they drew up the blinds 
again, as though the carriage were empty, and directed 
Mr. Haredale to ride forward, that he might not attract 
attention by seeming .to belong to it. 

The wisdom of this proceeding was sufficiently ob- 
vious, for as they hurried through the city they passed 
among several groups of men, who, if they had not sup- 
posed the chaise to be quite empty, would certainly have 
stopped it. But those within keeping quite close, and the 
driver tarrying to be asked no questions, they reached 
the prison without interruption, and, once there, had 
him out, and safe within its gloomy walls, in a twin- 
kling. 

With eager eyes and strained attention, Mr. Haredale 
saw him chained, and locked and barred up in his cell. 
Nay, when he had left the jail, and stood in the free 
street, without, he felt the iron plates upon the doors. 


68 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


with his hands, and drew them over the stone wall, to as- 
sure himself that it was real ; and to exult in its being so 
strong, and rough, and cold. It was not until he turned 
his back upon the jail, and glanced along the empty 
streets, so lifeless and quiet in the bright morning, that 
he felt the weight upon his heart ; that he knew he w'as 
tortured by anxiety for those he had left at home ; and 
that home itself was but another bead in the long rosary 
of his regrets. • < - 

I ' . r; • ? t-;! t 


,1 


i;. 



BARNABY RUDGE. 


GO 


CHAPTER LXII. 

The prisoner, left to himself, sat down upon his bed- 
liead : and resting his elbows on his knees, and his chin 
upon his hands, remained in that attitude for hours. It 
would be hard to say, of what nature his reflections were. 
They had no distinctness, and, saving for some flashes 
now and then, no reference to his condition or the train 
of circumstances by which it had been brought about. 
The cracks in the pavement of his cell, the chinks in the 
wall where stone was joined to stone, the bars in the 
window, the iron ring upon the floor, — such things as 
these, subsiding strangely into one another, and awaken- 
ing an indescribable kind of interest and amusement, en- 
grossed his whole mind ; and although at the bottom of 
his every thought there was an uneasy sense of guilt, 
and 'dread of death, he felt no more than that vague con- 
sciousness of it, which a sleeper has of pain. It pursues 
him through his dreams, gnaws at the heart of all his 
fancied pleasures, robs the banquet of its taste, music of 
its sweetness, makes happiness itself unhappy, and yet 
is no bodilv sensation, but a phantom without shape, or 
form, or visible presence ; pervading everything, but hav- 
ing no existence ; recognizable everywhere, but nowhere 
>een or touched, or met with face to face, until the sleep 
\9 past, and waking agony returns. 

After a long time, the door of his cell opened. He 


70 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


looked up ; saw the blind man enter ; and relapsed into 
his former position. 

Guided by his breathing, the visitor advanced to where 
he sat ; and stopping beside him, and stretching out his 
hand to assure himself that he was right, remained, for a 
good space, silent. 

“ This is bad, Rudge. This is bad,” he said at length. 

The prisoner shuffled with his feet upon the ground in 
turning his body from him, but made no other answer. 

^ How were you taken ? ” he asked. “ And where ? 
You never told me more than half your secret. No 
matter; I know it now. How was it, and where, eh?” 
he asked again, coming still nearer to him. 

“ At Chigwell,” said the other. 

“ At Chigwell ! How came you there ? ” 

“ Because I went there, to avoid the man I stumbled 
on,” he answered. “ Because I was chased and driven 
there, by him and Fate. Because I was urged to go 
there, by something stronger than my own will. When 
I found him watching in the house she used to live in, 
night after night, I knew I never could escape him — • 
never ! and when I heard the Bell ” — ■ 

He shivered ; muttered that it was very cold ; paced 
quickly up and down the narrow cell ; and sitting down 
again, fell into his old posture. 

“ You were saying,” said the blind man, after another 
pause, “ that when you heard the Bell ” — 

“ Let it be, will you ? ” he retorted in a hurried voice. 

It hangs there yet.” 

The blind man turned a wistful and inquisitive face 
towards him, but he continued to speak, without noticing 
him. 

“ I went to Chigwell, in search of the mob. I have 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


71 


been so hunted and beset by this man, that I knew my 
only hope of safety lay in joining them. They had gone 
on before ; I followed them when it left off.” 

« When what left off? ” 

“ The Bell. They had quitted the place. I hoped 
that some of them might be still lingering among the 
ruins, and was searching for them when I heard ” — he 
drew a long breath, and wiped his forehead with his 
sleeve — “ his voice.” 

“ Saying w^hat ? ” 

“ No matter what. I don’t know. I was then at the 
foot of the turret, where I did the ” — 

“ Ay,” said the blind man, nodding his head with per- 
fect composure, “ I understand.” 

“ I climbed the stair, of so much of it as was left ; 
meaning to hide till he had gone. But he heard me ; and 
followed almost as soon as I set foot upon the ashes.” 

“ You might have hidden in the wall, and thrown him 
down, or stabbed him,” said the blind man. 

“ Might I ? Between that man and me, was one who 
led him on — I saw it, though he did not — and raised 
above his head a bloody hand. It was in the room 
above that he and I stood glaring at each other on the 
night of the murder, and before he fell he raised his 
hand like that, and fixed his eyes on me. 1 knew the 
chase would end there.” 

“ You have a strong fancy,” said the blind man, with 

smile. 

“ Strengthen yours with blood, and see what it will 
come to.” 

He groaned, and rocked himself, and looking up for 
ihe first time, said, in a low, hollow voice: — 

“ Eight-and-twenty years ! Eight-and-twenty years ! 


72 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


He has never changed in all that time, never grown 
older, nor altered in the least degree. He has been 
before me in the dark night, and the broad sunny day ; 
in the twilight, the moonlight, the sunlight, the light of 
fire, and lamp, and candle ; and in the d^pest gloom. 
Always the same ! In company, in solitude, on land, on 
shipboard ; sometimes leaving me alone for months, and 
sometimes always with me. I have seen him, at sea, 
come gliding in the dead of night along the bright re- 
flection of the moon in the calm water ; and I have seen 
him, on quays and market-places, with his hand uplifted, 
towering the centre of a busy crowd, unconscious of the 
terrible form that had its silent stand among them. 
Fancy ! Are you real ? Am. I ? Are these iron fetters, 
riveted on me by the smith’s hammer, or are they fancies 
I can shatter at a blow ? ” 

The blind man listened in silence. 

“ Fancy ! Do I fancy that I killed him ? Do I fancy 
that as I left the chamber where he lay, I saw the face 
of a man peeping from a dark door, who plainly showed 
me by his fearful, looks that he suspected what I had 
done ? Do I remember that I spoke fairly to him — that 
I drew nearer — nearer yet ; — with the hot knife in my 
sleeve ? Do I fancy how he died ? Did he stagger back 
into the angle of the wall into which I had hemmed him, 
and, bleeding inwardly, stand, not fall, a corpse before 
me ? Did I see him, for an instant, as I see you now, 
erect and on his feet — but dead ! ” 

The blind man, who knew that he had risen, motioned 
him to sit down again upon his bedstead ; but he took no 
notice of the gesture. 

“ It was then I thought, for the first time, of fastening 
the murder upon him. It was then I dressed him in my 


BAKNABY BUDGE. 


' 73 


clothes, and dragged him down the back-stairs to the 
piece of water. Do I remember listening to the bub- 
bles that came rising up when I had rolled him in ? Do 
I remember wiping the water from my face, and because 
the body splashed it there, in its descent, feeling as if it 
must be blood ? / 

“ Did I go home when I had done ? And oh, my 
God ! how long it took to do ! Did I stand before my 
wife, and tell her ? Did I see her fall upon the ground ; 
and, when I stooped to raise her, did she thrust me back 
with a force that cast me off as if I had been a child, 
staining the hand with which she clasped my wrist ? Is 
that fancy ? 

“ Did she go down upon her knees, and call on Heaven 
to witness that she and her unborn child renounced me 
from that hour; and did she, in words so solemn that 
they turned me cold — me, fresh from the horrors my 
own hands had made — warn me to fly while there was 
time ; for though she would be silent, being my wretched 
wife, she would not shelter me ? Did I go forth that 
night, abjured of God and man, and anchored deep in 
hell, tg wander at my cable’s length about the earth, and 
surely be drawn down at last ? ” 

a Why did you return ? ” said the blind man. 

“ Why is blood red ? I could no more help it, than I 
could* live without breath. I struggled against the im- 
pulse, but I was drawn back, through every difficult and 
adverse circumstance, as by a mighty engine. Nothing 
could stop me. The day and hour were none of my 
choice. Sleeping and waking, I had been among the 
old haunts for years — had visited my own grave. Why 
did I come back ? Because this jail was gaping for me, 
and he stood beckoning at the door.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


r4 

^ You were not known ? ” said the blind man. 

** I was a man who had been twenty-two years dead. 
No. I was not known.” 

“ You should have kept your secret better.” 

“ My secret ? Mine ? It was a secret, any breath of 
air could whisper at its will. The stars had it in their 
twinkling, the water in its flowing, the leaves in their 
rustling, the seasons in their return. It lurked in 
strangers’ faces, and their voices. Everything had lips 
on which it always trembled. — My secret ! ” 

“ It was revealed by your own act at any rate,” said 
the blind man.. 

“ The act was not mine. I did it, but it was not mine. 
I was forced at times to wander round, and round, and 
round that spot. If you had chained me up when the 
fit was on me, I should have broken away, and gone 
there. As truly as the loadstone draws iron towards it, 
so he, lying at the bottom of his grave, could draw me 
near him when he would. Was that fancy ? Did I like 
to go there, or did I strive and wrestle with the power 
that forced me ? ” 

The blind man shrugged his shoulders, and smil^ in- 
credulously. The prisoner again resumed his old atti- 
tude, and for a long time both were mute. 

“ I suppose then,” said his visitor, at length breaking 
silence, “ that you are penitent and resigned ; that you 
desire to make peace with everybody (in particular, with 
your wife who has brought you to this) ; and that you 
ask no greater favor than to be carried to Tyburn as 
soon as possible ? That being the case, I had better 
take my leave. I am not good enough to be com- 
pany for you.” 

“ Have I not told you,” said the other fiercely, “ that 


BAKNABY BUDGE. 


75 


I havr: striven and wrestled with the power that brought 
me here ? Has my whole life, for eight-and-twenty years, 
been one perpetual struggle and resistance, and do you 
think I want to lie down and die ? Do all men shrink 
from death — I most of all ! ” 

“ That’s better said. That’s better spoken, Rudge — 
but I’ll not call you that again — than anything you 
have said yet,” returned the blind man, speaking more 
familiarly, and laying his hand upon his arm. “ Look- 
ye, — I never killed a man myself, for I have never 
been placed in a position that made it worth my while. 
Further, I am not an advocate for killing men, and I 
don’t think I should recommend it or like it — for it’s 
very hazardous — under any circumstances. But as you 
had the misfortune to get into this trouble before I made 
your acquaintance, and as you have been my companion, 
and have been of use to me for a long time now, I over- 
look that part of the matter, and am only anxious that 
you shouldn’t die unnecessarily. Now, I do not consider 
that, at present, it is at all necessary.” 

“ What else is left me ? ” returned the prisoner. “ To 
eat my way through these walls with my teeth ? ” 

“ Something easier than that,” returned his friend. 
“ Promise me that you will talk no more of these fancies 
of yours — idle, foolish things, quite beneath a man — 
and I’ll tell you what I mean.” 

“ Tell me,” said the other. 

“ Your worthy lady with the tender conscience ; your 
scrupulous, virtuous, punctilious, but not blindly affec- 
tionate wife ” — 

“ What of her ? ” 

“ Is now in London.” 

“ A curse upon her, be she where she may ! ” 


76 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ That’s natural enough. If she had taken her an- 
nuity as usual, you would not have been here, and we 
should have been better off. But that’s apart from the 
business. She’s in London. Scared, as I suppose, and 
have no doubt, by my representation when I waited upon 
her, that you were close at hand (which I, of course, 
urged only as an inducement to compliance, knowing that 
she was not pining to see you), she left that place, and 
travelled up to London.” 

“ How do you know ? ” 

“ From my friend the noble captain — the illustrious 
general — the bladder, Mr. Tappertit. I learnt from 
him the last time I saw him, which was yesterday, that 
your son who is called Barnaby — not after his father I 
suppose ” — 

“ Death ! does that matter now ! ” 

— “ You are impatient,” said the blind man calmly ; 
“ it’s a good sign, and looks like life — that your son 
Barnaby had been lured away from her by one of his 
companions who knew him of old, at Chigwell ; and that 
he is now among the rioters.” 

“ And what is that to me ? If father and son be 
hanged together what comfort shall I find in that? ” 

“ Stay — stay, my friend,” returned the blind man, 
with a cunning look, “ you travel fast to journeys’ ends. 
Suppose I track my lady out, and say thus much : ‘ You 
want your son, ma’am — good. I, knowing those who 
tempt him to remain among them, can restore him to 
you, ma'am — good. You must pay a price, ma’am, for 
his restoration — good again. The price is small, and 
easy to be paid — dear ma’am, that’s best of all.’ ” 

“ What mockery is this ? ” 

“Very likely, she may reply in those words. ‘No 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


77 


mockery at all,’ I answer : ‘ Madam, a person said to 
be your husband (identity is difficult of proof after the 
lapse of many years) is in prison, his life in peril — 
the charge against him, murder. Now, ma’am, your hus- 
band has been dead a long, long time. The gentleman 
never can be confounded with him, if you will have the 
goodness to say a few words, on oath, as to when he died, 
and how ; and that this person (who I am told resembles 
him in some degree) is no more he than I am. Such 
testimony will set the question quite at rest. Pledge 
yourself to me to give it, ma’am, and I will undertake 
to keep your son (a fine lad) out of harm’s way until 
you have done this trifling service, when he shall be 
delivered up to you, safe and sound. On the other 
hand, if you decline to do so, I fear he will be betrayed, 
and handed over to the law, which will assuredly sen- 
tence him to suffer death. It is, in fact, a choice between 
his life and death. If you refuse, he swings. If you 
comply, the timber is not grown, nor the hemp sown, that 
shall do him any harm.’ ” 

“ There is a gleam of hope in this ! ” cried the pris- 
oner. 

“A gleam ! ” returned his friend, “ a noon-blaze ; a full 
and glorious daylight. Hush ! I hear the tread of dis- 
tant feet. Rely on me.” 

“ When shall I hear more ? ” 

“ As soon as I do. I should hope, to-morrow. They 
are coming to say that our time for talk is over. I hear 
the jingling of the keys. Not another word of this just 
now, or they may overhear us.” 

As he said these words, the lock was turned, and one 
of the prison turnkeys appearing at the door, announced 
that it was time for visitors to leave the jail. 


78 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ So soon ! ” said Stagg, meekly. But it can’t be 
helped. Cheer up, friend. This mistake will soon be 
set at rest, and then you are a man again ! If this 
charitable gentleman will lead a blind man (who has 
nothing in return but prayers) to the prison-porch, and 
set him with his face towards the west, he will do a 
worthy deed. Thank you, good sir. I thank you very 
kindly.” 

So saying, and pausing for an instant at the door to 
turn his grinning face towards his friend, he departed. 

When the officer had seen him to the porch, he re- 
turned, and again unlocking and unbarring the door of 
the cell, set it wide open, informing its inmate that he 
was at liberty to walk in the adjacent yard, if he thought 
proper, for an hour. 

The prisoner answered with a sullen nod ; and being 
left alone again, sat brooding over what he had heard, 
and pondering upon the hopes the recent conversation 
had awakened; gazing abstractedly, the while he did 
so, on the light without, and watching the shadows 
thrown by one wall on another, and on the stone-paved 
ground. 

It w^as a dull, square yard, made cold and gloomy by 
high walls, and seeming to chill the very sunlight. The 
stone, so bare, and rough, and obdurate, filled even him 
with longing thoughts of meadow-land and trees ; and 
with a burning wish to be at liberty. As he looked, 
he rose, and leaning against the door-post, gazed up at 
the bright blue sky, smiling even on that dreary home 
of crime. He seemed, for a moment, to remember lying 
w his back in some sweet-scented place, and gazing at 
it through moving branches, long ago. 

His attention was suddenly attracted by a clanking 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


7S 


sound — he knew what it was, for he had startled him- 
self by making the same noise in walking to the door. 
Presently a voice began to sing, and he saw the shadow’ 
of a figure on the pavement. It stopped — was silent 
all at once, as though the person for a moment had for- 
gotten where he was, but soon remembered — and so, 
with the same clanking noise, the shadow disappeared. 

He walked out into the court and paced it to and 
fro ; startling the echoes, as he went, with the harsh 
jangling of his fetters. There was a door near his, 
which, like his, stood ajar. 

He had not taken half a dozen turns up and down 
the yard,, when, standing still to observe this door, he 
heard the clanking sound again. A face looked out of 
the grated window — he saw it very dimly, for the cell 
was dark and the bars were heavy — and directly after- 
wards, a man appeared, and came towards him. 

For the sense of loneliness he had, he might have 
been in the jail a year. Made eager by the hope of 
companionship, he quickened his pace, and hastened to 
meet the man half way — 

What was this ! His son ! 

They stood face to face, staring at each other. He 
shrinking and cowed, despite himself ; Barnaby strug- 
gling with his imperfect memory, and wondering where 
he had seen that face before. He was not uncertain 
long, for suddenly he laid hands upon him, and striv- 
ing to bear him to the ground, cried : — 

“ Ah ! I know ! You are the robber ! ” 

He said nothing in reply at first, but held down his 
head, and struggled with him silently. Finding the 
younger man too strong for him, he raised his face, 
ooked close into his eyes, and said : — 


8 ^ 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“I am your father.” 

God knows what magic the name had for his earn; 
but Barnaby released his hold, fell back, and looked 
at him aghast. Suddenly he sprung towards him, put 
his arms about his neck, and pressed his head against 
his cheek. 

Yes, yes, he was ; he was sure he was. But where 
had he been so long, and why had he left his mother 
by herself, or worse than by herself, with her poor 
foolish boy? And had she really been as happy as 
they said. And where was she ? Was she near there? 
She was not happy now, and he in jail ? Ah, no. 

Not a word was said in answer; but Grip croaked 
loudly, and hopped about them, round and round, as if 
enclosing them in a magic circle, and invoking all the 
powers of mischief. - 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


81 


CHAPTER LXin. 

During the whole of this day, every regiment in or 
near the metropolis was on duty in one or other part of 
the town ; and the regulars and militia, in obedience to 
the orders which were sent to every barrack and station 
within twenty-four hours’ journey, began to pour in by 
all the roads. But the disturbances had attained to such 
a formidable height, and the rioters had grown, with im- 
punity, to be so audacious, that the sight of this great 
force, continually augmented by new arrivals, instead of 
operating as a check, stimulated them to outrages of 
greater hardihood than any they had yet committed ; 
and helped to kindle a flame in London, the like of 
which had never been beheld, even in its ancient and 
rebellious times. 

All yesterday, and on this day likewise, the com- 
mander-in-chief endeavored to arouse the magistrates 
to a sense of their duty, and in particular the Lord 
Mayor, who was the faintest-hearted and most timid of 
them all. With this object, large bodies of the soldiery 
were several times despatched to the Mansion House to 
await his orders : but as he could, by no threats or per- 
suasions, be induced to give any, and as the men re- 
mained in the open street, fruitlessly for any good pur- 
pose, and thrivingly for a very bad one ; these laudable 
attempts did harm rather than good. For the crowd, 
becoming speedily acquainted with the Lord Mayor’s 

voi. in. 6 


82 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


temper, did not I'ail to take advantage of it by boast- 
ing that even the civil authorities were opposed to the 
Papists, and could not find it in their hearts to molest 
those who were guilty of no other offence. These vaunts 
they took care to make within the hearing of the sol- 
diers ; and they, being naturally loath to quarrel with the 
people, received their advances kindly enough : answer- 
ing, when they were asked if they desired to fire upon 
(heir countrymen, “ No, they would be damned if they 
did ; ” and showing much honest simplicity, and good- 
nature. The feeling that the military were No Popery 
men, and were ripe for disobeying orders and joining the 
mob, soon became very prevalent in consequence. Ru- 
mors of their disaffection, and of their leaning towards 
the popular cause, spread from mouth to mouth with 
astonishing rapidity; and whenever they were drawn 
up idly in the streets or squares, there was sure to be 
a crowd about them, cheering, and shaking hands, and 
treating them with a great show of confidence and af- 
fection. 

By this time, the crowd was everywhere ; all conceal- 
ment and disguise were laid aside, and they pervaded the 
whole town. If any man among them wanted money, 
he had but to knock at the door of a dwelling-house, or 
walk into a shop, and demand it in the rioters’ name ; 
and his demand was instantly complied with. The 
peaceable citizens being afraid to lay hands upon them, 
■singly and alone, it may be easily supposed that when 
gathered together in bodies, they were perfectly secure 
from interruption. They assembled in the sti-eets, trav- 
ersed them at their will and pleasure, and publicly con- 
certed their plans. Business was quite suspended ; the 
greater part of the shops were closed ; most of the 


BARNABY RUDGE, 


83 


houses displayed a blue flag in token of their adher 
ence to the popular side ; and even the Jews in Hounds- 
ditch, White-chapel, and those quarters, wrote upon their 
doors or window-shutters “ This House is a True Prot- 
estant.” The crowd was the law, and never was the 
law held in greater dread, or more implicitly obeyed. 

It was about six o’clock in the evening, when a vast 
mob poured into Lincoln’s Inn Fields by every avenue, 
and divided — evidently in pursuance of a previous de- 
sign — into several parties. It must not be understood 
that this arrangement was known to the whole crowd, 
but that it was the work of a few leaders ; who, min- 
gling with the men as they came upon the ground, and 
calling to them to fall into this or that party, effected 
it as rapidly as if it had been determined on by a coun- 
cil of the whole number, and every man had known his 
place. 

It was perfectly notorious to the assemblage that the 
largest body, which comprehended about two thirds of 
the whole, was designed for the attack on Newgate. It 
comprehended all the rioters who had been conspicuous 
in any of their former proceedings ; all those whom they 
recommended as daring hands and fit for the work ; all 
those whose companions had been taken in the riots ; and 
a great number of people who were relatives or friends 
of felons in the jail. This last class included, not only 
the. most desperate and utterly abandoned villains in Lon- 
don, but some who were comparatively innocent. There 
was more than one woman there, disguised in man’s at- 
tire, and bent upon the rescue of a child or brother. 
There were the two sons of a man who lay under sen- 
tence of death, and who was to be executed along with 
three others, on the next day but one. There was a 


84 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


great party of boys whose fellow pickpockets were in 
the prison ; and at the skirts of all, a score of miser- 
able women, outcasts from the world, seeking to release 
some other fallen creature as miserable as themselves, 
or moved by a general sympathy perhaps — God knows 
— with all who were without hope, and wretched. 

Old swords, and pistols without ball or powder ; sledge 
hammers, knives, axes, saws, and weapons pillaged from 
the butchers* shops; a forest of iron bars and wooden 
clubs ; long ladders for scaling the walls, each carried on 
the shoulders of a dozen men ; lighted torches ; tow 
smeared with pitch, and tar, and brimstone ; staves 
roughly plucked from fence and paling ; and even 
crutches taken from crippled beggars in the streets; 
composed their arms. When all was ready, Hugh and 
Dennis, with Simon Tappertit between them, led the 
way. Roaring and chafing like an angry sea, the crowd 
pressed after them. 

Instead of going straight down Holborn to the jail, 
as all expected, their leaders took the way to Clerken- 
well, and pouring down a quiet street, halted before a 
locksmith’s house — the Golden Key. 

“Beat at the door,” cried Hugh to the men about 
him. “We want one of his craft to-night. Beat it in, 
if no one answers.” 

The shop was shut. Both door and shutters were of 
a strong and sturdy kind, and they knocked without 
effect. But the impatient crowd raising a cry of “ Set 
fire to the house ! ” and torches being passed to the front, 
an upper window was thrown open, and the stout old 
locksmith stood before them. 

“ What now, you villains ! ” he demanded. “ Where 
is my daughter ? ” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


So 


“Ask no questions of us, old man,” retorted Hugh 
waving his comrades to be silent, “ but come down, and 
biing the tools of your trade. We want you.” 

“ Want me ! ” cried the locksmith, glancing at the regi« 
mental dress he wore : “ Ay, and if some that I could 
name possessed the hearts of mice, ye should have had 
me long ago. Mark me, my lad — and you about him 
do the same. There are a score among ye whom I see 
now and know, wlm are dead men from this hour. Be- 
gone ! and rob an undertaker’s while you can ! You’ll 
want some coffins before long.” 

“ Will you come down ? ” cried Hugh. 

“ Will you give me my daughter, ruffian ? ” cried the 
locksmith. 

“ I know nothing of her,” Hugh rejoined. “ Burn the 
door ! ” 

“ Stop ! ” cried the locksmith, in a voice that made 
them falter — presenting, as he spoke, a gun. “ Let an 
old man do that. You can spare him better.” 

The young fellow who held the light, and who was 
stooping down before the door, rose hastily at these 
words, and fell back. The locksmith ran his eye along 
the upturned faces, and kept the weapon levelled at the 
threshold of his house. It had no other rest than ^his 
shoulder, but was as steady as the house itself. 

“ Let the man who does it, take heed to his prayers,” 
he said firmly ; “ I warn him.” 

Snatching a torch from one who stood near him, 
Hugh was stepping forward with an oath, when he was 
arrested by a shrill and piercing shriek, and, looking up- 
ward, saw a fluttering garment on the house-top. 

There was another shriek, and another, and then a 
bhrill voice cried, “ Is Simmun below ! ” At the same 


86 


PARNABY RUDGK 


moment a lean neck was stretched over the parapet, and 
Miss Miggs, indistinctly seen in the gathering gloom of 
evening, screeched in a frenzied manner, “ Oh ! dear 
gentlemen, let me hear Simmun’s answer from his own 
lips. Speak to me, Simmun. Speak to me ! 

Mr. Tappertit, who was not at all flattered by this 
compliment^ looked up, and bidding her hold her peace, 
ordered her to come down and open the door, for they 
wanted her master, and would take n(^ denial. 

“ Oh good gentlemen ! ” cried Miss Miggs. “ Oh my 
own precious, precious Simmun ” — 

“ Hold your nonsense, will you ! ” retorted Mr. Tap- 
pertit ; “ and come down and open the door. — G. Var- 
den, drop that gun, or it will be worse for you.” 

“ Don’t mind his gun,” screamed Miggs. “ Simmun 
and gentlemen, I poured a mug of table-beer right down 
the barrel.” 

The crowd gave a loud shout, which was followed by 
a roar of laughter. 

“ It wouldn’t go off, not if you w’^as to load it up to the 
muzzle,” screamed Miggs. “ Simmun and gentlemen, 
I’m locked up in the front attic, through the little door 
on the right hand when you think you’ve got to the very 
top of the stairs — and up the flight of corner steps, 
being careful not to knock your heads against the rafters, 
and not to tread on one side in case you should fall into 
the two-pair bedroom through the lath and plasture, 
which do not bear, but the contrairy. Simmun and 
gentlemen. I’ve been locked up here for safety, but my 
endeavors has always been, and always will be, to be on 
the right side — the blessed side — and to pronounce 
the Pope of Babylon, and all her inward and her out- 
ward workings, which is Pagin. My sentiments is of 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


87 


little consequences, I know,” cried Miggs, with additional 
shrillness, “ for my positions is but a servant, and as 
sich, of humilities, still I gives expressions to my feel- 
ings, and places my reliances on them which entertains 
my own opinions ! ” 

Without taking much notice of these outpourings of 
Miss Miggs after she had made her first announcement 
in relation to the gun, the crowd raised a ladder against 
the window where the locksmith stood, and notwithstand- 
ing that he closed, and fastened, and defended it man- 
fully, soon forced an entrance by shivering the glass and 
breaking in the frames. After dealing a few stout blows 
about him, he found himself defenceless, in the midst of 
a furious crowd, which overflowed the room and softened 
oflT in a confused heap of faces at the door and window. 

They were very wrathful with him (for he had 
wounded two men), and even called out to those in 
front, to bring him forth and hang him on a lamp-post. 
But Gabriel was quite undaunted, and looked from 
Hugh and Dennis, who held him by either arm, to 
Simon Tappertit, who confronted him. 

“ You have robbed me of my daughter,” said the lock- 
smith, “ who is far dearer to me than my life ; and you 
may take my life, if you will. I bless God that I have 
been enabled to keep my wife free of this scene; and 
that He has made me a man who will not ask mercy at 
such hands as yours.” 

“ And a wery game old gentleman you are,” said Mr. 
Dennis, approvingly ; “ and you express yourself like a 
man. What’s the odds, brother, whether it’s a lamp-post 
to-night, or a feather-bed ten year to come, eh ? ” 

The locksmith glanced at him disdainfully, but re- 
turned no other answer. 


88 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“For my part,” said the hangman, who particularly 
favored the lamp-post suggestion, “I honor your prin- 
ciples. Th^’re mine exactly. In such sentiments as 
them,” and here he emphasized his discourse with an 
oath, “ I’m ready to meet you or any man half way. — 
Have you got a bit of cord anywheres handy ? Don’t 
put yourself out of the way, if you haven’t. A hand- 
kecher will do.” 

“ Don’t be a fool, master,” whispered Hugh, seizing 
Varden roughly by the shoulder ; “ but do as you’re bid. 
You’ll soon hear what you’re wanted for. Do it !” 

“ I’ll do nothing at your request, or that of any scoun- 
drel here,” returned the locksmith. “ If you want any 
service from me, you may spare yourselves the pains of 
telling me what it is. I tell you, beforehand. I’ll do 
nothing for you.” 

Mr. Dennis was so affected by this constancy on the 
part of the stanch old man, that he protested — almost 
with tears in his eyes — that to balk his inclinations 
would be an act of cruelty and hard dealing to which he; 
for one, never could reconcile his conscience. The gen- 
tleman, he said, had avowed in so many words that = he 
was ready for working off ; such being the case, he con- 
sidered it their duty, as a civilized and enlightened 
crowd, to work him off. It was not often, he observed, 
that they had it in their power to accommodate them- 
selves to the wishes of those from whom they had the 
misfortune to differ. Having now found an individual 
who expressed a desire which they could reasonably in- 
dulge, (and for himself he was free to confess that in his 
opinion that desire did honor to his feelings,) he hoped 
they would decide to accede to his proposition before 
going any farther. It was an experiment which, skil* 


BARXABY RUDGE. 


89 


fully and dexterously performed, would be over in five 
minutes, with great comfort and satisfaction to all par- 
ties ; and though it did not become him (Mr. Dennis) to 
speak well of himself, he trusted he might be allowed to 
say that he had practical knowledge of the subject, and, 
being naturally of an obliging and friendly disposition, 
would work the gentleman off with a deal of pleasure. 

These remarks, which were addressed in the midst of 
a frightful din and turmoil to those immediately about 
him, were received with great favor ; not so much, per- 
haps, because of the hangman's eloquence, as on account 
of the locksmith’s obstinacy. Gabriel was in imminent 
peril, and he knew it ; but he preserved • a steady 
silence; and would have done so, if they had been 
debating whether they should roast him at a slow fire. 

As the hangman spoke, there was some stir and con- 
fusion on the ladder ; and directly he was silent — so 
immediately upon his holding his peace, that the crowd 
below had no time to learn what he had been saying, or 
to shout in response — some one at the window cried : — 

“ He has a gray head. He is an old man : don’t hurt 
him ! ” 

The locksmith turned, with a start, towards the place 
from which the words had come, and looked hurriedly 
at the people who were hanging on the ladder and 
clinging to each other. 

“ Pay no respect to my gray hair, young man,” he said, 
answering the voice and not any one he saw. “ I don’t 
ask it. My heart is green enough to scorn and despise 
every man among you, band of robbers that you are ! ” 

This incautious speech by no means tended to appease 
the ferocity of the crowd. They cried again to have 
him brought out; and it would have gone hard with the 


90 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


honest locksmith, but. that Hugh reminded them in an- 
swer, that they wanted his services, and must have them. 

“ So, tell him what we want,” he said to Simon Tap- 
pertit, “and quickly. And open your ears, master, if 
you would ever use them after to-night.” 

Gabriel folded his arms, which were now at liberty, 
and eyed his old ’prentice in silence. 

“ Lookye, Varden,” said Sim, “ we’re bound for New- 
gate.” 

“ I know you are,” returned the locksmith. “ You 
never said a truer word than that.” 

“ To burn it down, I mean,” said Simon, “ and force 
the gates,. and set the prisoners at liberty. You helped 
to make the lock of the great door.” 

“I did,” said the locksmith. “You owe me no thanks 
for that — as you’ll find before long.” 

“Maybe,” returned his journeyman, “but you must 
show us how to force it.” 

“Must I!” 

“ Yes ; for you know, and I don’t. You must come 
along with us, and pick it with your own hands.” 

“ When I do,” said the locksmith quietly, “ my hands 
shall drop off at the wrists, and you shall wear them, 
Simon Tappertit, on your shoulders for epaulettes.” 

“ We’ll see that,” cried Hugh, interposing, as the in- 
dignation of the crowd again burst forth. “ You fill a 
basket with the tools he’ll want, while I bring him down- 
stairs. Open the doors below, some of you. And light 
. the great captain, others ! Is there no business afoot, 
my lads, that you can do nothing but stand and grum- 
ble?” 

They looked at one another, and quickly dispersing, 
Bwarmed over the house, plundering and breaking, ao* 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


91 


cording to their custom, and carrying off such articles of 
value as happened to please their fancy. They had no 
great length of time for these proceedings, for the basket 
of tools was soon prepared and slung over a man’s shoul- 
ders. The preparations being now completed, and every- 
thing ready for the attack, those who were pillaging and 
destroying in the other rooms were called down to the 
workshop. They were about to issue forth, when the 
man who had been last up-stairs, stepped forward, and 
asked if the young woman in the garret (who was 
making a terrible noise, he said, and kept on screaming 
without the least cessation) was to be released? 

For his owm part, Simon Tappertit would certainly 
have replied in the negative, but the mass of his com- 
panions, mindful of the good service she had done in the 
matter of the gun, being of a different opinion, he had 
nothing for it but to answer. Yes. The man, accord- 
ingly, went back again to the rescue, and presently re- 
turned with Miss Miggs, limp and doubled up, and very 
damp from much weeping. 

As the young lady had given no tokens of conscious- 
ness on their way down-stairs, the bearer reported her 
either dead or dying ; and being at some loss what to do 
with her, was looking round for a convenient bench or 
heap of ashes on which to place her senseless form, when 
she suddenly came upon her feet by some mysterious 
means, thrust back her hair, stared wildly at Mr. Tap- 
pertit, cried “My Simmuns’s life is not a wictim! ” and 
dropped into his arms with such promptitude that he 
stjiggered and reeled some paces back, beneath his lovely 
burden. 

“ Oh bother ! ” said Mr. Tappertit. “ Here. Catch 
hold of her, somebody. Lock her up again ; she never 
•ught to have been let out.” 


92 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


My Simmun ! ” cried Miss Miggs, in tears, and 
faintly. “ My forever ever blessed Simmun ! ” 

“ Hold up, will you,” said Mr. Tappertit, in a very 
unresponsive tone, “ I’ll let you fall if you don’t. What 
are you sliding your feet off the ground for ? ” 

“ My angel Simmuns ! ” murmured Miggs — “he prom- 
ised ” — 

. “ Promised ! Well, and I’ll keep my promise,” an- 
swered Simon, testily. “I mean to provide for you, 
don’t I ? Stand up ! ” 

“ Where am I to go ? What is to become of me 
after my actions of this night ! ” cried Miggs. “ What 
resting-places now remains but in the silent tombses ! ” 
“ I wish you was in the silent tombses, I do,” cried 
Mr. Tappertit, “and boxed up tight, in a good strong 
one. Here,” he cried to one of the by-standers, in whose 
ear he whispered for a moment. “Take her off, will 
you. You understand where ? ” 

The fellow nodded ; and taking her in his arms, not- 
withstanding her broken protestations, and her struggles 
(which latter species of opposition, involving scratches, 
was much more difficult of resistance), carried her away. 
They who were in the house poured out into the street ; 
the locksmith was taken to the head of the crowd, and 
required to walk between his two conductors ; the whole 
body was put in rapid motion ; and without any shouting 
or noise they bore down straight on Newgate, and halted 
in a d3ns3 mass before the prison-gate. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


93 


CHAPTER LXIV. • ' 

Breaking the silence they had hitherto preserved, 
they raised a great cry as soon as they were ranged be- 
fore the jail, and demanded to speak with the governor. 
Their visit was not wholly unexpected, for his house, 
which fronted the street, was strongly barricaded, the 
wicket-gate of the prison was closed up, and at no loop- 
hole or grating was any person to be seen. Before they 
had repeated their summons many times, a man appeared 
upon the roof of the governor’s house, and asked what it 
was they wanted. 

Some said one thing, some another, and some only 
groaned and hissed. It being now nearly dark, and the 
house high, many persons in the throng were not aware 
that any one had come to answer them, and continued 
their clamor until the intelligence was gradually diffused 
through the whole concourse. Ten minutes or more 
elapsed before any one voice could be heard with toler- 
able distinctness ; during which interval the figure re- 
mained perched alone, against the summeikevening sky, 
looking down into the troubled street. 

“ Are you,” said Hugh at length, “ Mr. Akerman, the 
head jailer here ? ” • ' 

“ Of course he is, brother,” whispered Dennis. But 
Hugh, without minding him, took his answer from the 
man himself 

“ Yes,” he said. “ I am.” 


94 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ You have got some friends of ours in your custody, 
master.” 

“ I have a good many people in my custody.” He 
glanced downward, as he spoke, into the jail : and the 
feeling that he could see into the different yards, and 
that he overlooked everything which was hidden from 
their view by the rugged walls, so lashed and goaded the 
mob, that they howled like wolves. ’ 

“ Deliver up our friends,” said Hugh, “ and you may 
keep the rest.” 

“ It’s my duty to keep them all. I shall do my 
duty.” 

“If you don’t throw the doors open, we shall break 
’em' down,” said Hugh ; “ for we will have the rioters 
out.” • 

“All I can do, good people,” Akerman replied, “is 
to exhort you to disperse ; and to* remind you that the 
consequences of any disturbance in this place, will be 
very severe, and bitterly repented by most of you, when 
it is too late.” 

He made as though he would retire when he had said 
these words, but he was checked by the voice of the lock- 
smith. 

“ Mr. Akerman,” cried Gabriel, “ Mr. Akerman.” 

“ I will hear no more from any of you,” replied the 
governor, turning towards the speaker, and waving his 
hand. ' 

“ But I am not one of them,” said Gabriel. “ I am 
an honest man, Mr. Akerman ; a respectable tradesman 
■— Gabriel Varden, the locksmith. You know me ? ” 

“ You among the crowd ! ” cried the governor in an 
altered voice. 

“ Brought liere by force — brought here to pick the 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


95 


lock of the great door for them,” rejoined the locksmith. 
“ Bear witness for me, Mr. Akerman, that I refuse to do 
it ; and that I will not do it, come what may of my re- 
fusal. If any violence is done to me, please to remem- 
ber this.” 

. “ Is there no way of helping you ? ” said the governor 

“ None, Mr. Akerman. You’ll do your duty, and I’ll 
do mine. Once again, you robbers and cut-throats,” said 
the locksmith, turning round upon them, “ I refuse. Ah ! 
Howl till you’re hoarse. I refuse.” 

“ Stay — stay ! ” said the jailer, hastily. “ Mr. Var- 
den, I know you for a worthy man, and one who would 
g- do no unlawful act except upon compulsion ” — ' ' 

“ Upon compulsion, sir,” interposed the locksmith, who 
felt that the -tone in which this was said, conveyed the 
^ speaker’s impression that he had ample excuse for yield- 
^ ing to the furious multitude who beset and hemmed him 
in, on every side, and among whom he stood, an old man, 
! quite alone ; “ upon compulsion, sir. I’ll do nothing.” 

“ Where is that man,” said the keeper, anxiously, 
“ who spoke to me just now ? ” 

“ Here ! ” Hugh replied. 

“ Do you know what the guilt of murder is, and that 
by keeping that honest tradesman at your side you en- 
I danger his life ! ” 

I “We know it very well,” he answered, “for what else 
I did we bring him here ? Let’s have our friends, master, 
and you shall have your friend. Is that fair, lads ? ” 
The mob replied to him with a loud Hurrah ! 

“ You see how it is, sir ? ” cried Varden. “ Keep ’em 
out, in King George’s name. Remember what 1 have 
paid. Good-night ! ” 

There was no more parley. A shower of stones and 


96 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Other missiles compelled the keeper of the jail to retire ; 
and the mob, pressing on, and swarming round the walls, 
forced Gabriel Varden close up to the door. 

In vain the basket of tools was laid upon the ground 
before him, and he was urged in turn by promises, by 
blows, by offers of reward, and threats of instant death, 
to do the office for which they had brought him there. 
“ No,” cried the sturdy locksmith, “ I will not ! ” 

He had never loved his life so well as then, but 
nothing could move him. The savage faces that glared 
upon him, look where he would ; the cries of those who 
thirsted, like wild animals, for his blood ; the sight of 
men pressing forward, and trampling down their fellows, 
as they strove to reach him, and struck at him above the 
heads of other men, with axes and with iron bars ; all 
failed to daunt him. He looked from man to man, and 
face to face, and still, with quickened breath and lessen- 
ing color, cried firmly, “ I will not ! ” 

Dennis dealt him a blow upon the face which felled 
him to the ground. He sprung up again like a man in 
the prime of life, and with blood upon his forehead, 
caught him by the throat. 

“ You cowardly dog ! ” he said. “ Give me my daugh- 
ter. Give me my daughter.” 

They struggled together. Some cried “ Kill him,” 
and some (but they were not near enough) strove to 
trample him to death. Tug as he would at the old 
man’s wrists, the hangman could not force him to uu- 
clinch his liands. 

“ Is this all the return you make me, you ungrateful 
monster ? ” he articulated with great difficulty, and withj 
many oaths. 

Give me my daughter ! ” cried the locksmith, who 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


97 


was now as fierce as those who gathered round him: 
J “ Give me my daughter ! ” 

He was down again, and up, and down once more, 
and buffeting with a score of them, who bandied him 
from hand to hand, when one tall fellow, fresh from a 
! slaughter-house, whose dress and great thigh boots 
smoked hot with grease and blood, raised a pole-axe, and 
. swearing a horrible oath, aimed it at the old man’s un- 
covered head. At that instant, and in the very act, he 
fell himself, as if struck by lightning, and over his body 
i a one-armed man came darting to the locksmith’s side. 
, Another man was with him, and both caught the lock- 
smith roughly in their grasp. 

“ Leave him to us ! ” they cried to Hugh — struggling, 
1 as they spoke, to force a passage backward through the 
crowd. “ Leave him to us. Why do you waste your 
j whole strength on such as he, when a couple of men can 
1 finish him in as many minutes ! You lose time. Re- 
; member the prisoners ! remember Barnaby !” 

I The cry ran through the mob. Hammers began to 
I rattle on the walls ; and every man strove to reach the 
[ prison, and be among the foremost rank. Fighting their 
I way through the press and struggle, as desperately as if 
[ they were in the midst of enemies rather than their own 
I friends, the two men retreated with the locksmith be- 
I tween them, and dragged him through the very heart of 
i the concourse. 

I And now the strokes began to fall like hail upon the 
I gate, and on the strong building ; for those who could 
I not reach the door, spent their fierce rage on anything — 

I ^ven on the great blocks of stone, which shivered their 
j weapons into fragments, and made their hands and arms 
to tingle as if the walls were active in their stout resist- 
T 


VOL. III. 


BAKNABY BUDGE. 


Rnce, and dealt tliem back their blows. The clash of 
iron ringing upon iron, mingled with the deafening tu- 
mult and sounded high above it, as the great sledge- 
hammers rattled on the nailed and plated door : the 
sparks flew off in showers ; men worked in gangs, and 
at short intervals relieved each other, that all their 
strength might be devoted to the work ; but there stood 
the portal still, as grim and dark and strong as ever, and, 
saving for the dints upon its battered surface, quite un- 
changed. 

While some brought all their energies to bear upon 
this toilsome task ; and some, rearing ladders against the 
prison, tried to clamber to the summit of the walls they 
were too short to scale ; and some again engaged a body 
of police a hundred strong, and beat them back and trod 
them under foot by force of numbers ; others besieged 
the house on which the jailer had appeared, and, driving 
in the door, brought out his furniture, and piled it up 
against the prison gate, to make a bonfire which should 
burn it down. As soon as this device was understood, 
all those who had labored hitherto, cast down their tools 
and helped to swell the heap ; which reached half-way 
across the street, and was so high, that those who threw 
more fuel on the top, got up by ladders. When all the 
keeper’s goods were flung upon this costly pile, to the 
last fragment, they smeared it with the pitch, and tar, 
and rosin they had brought, and sprinkled it with turpen- 
tine. To all the woodwork round the prison-doors they 
did ,the like, leaving not a joist or beam untouched. 
This infernal christening performed, they fired the pile 
with lighted matches and with blazing tow, and then 
stood by, awaiting the result. 

The furniture being very dry, and rendered more com- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


99 


bustible by wax and oil, besides the arts they had used 
took fire at once. The flames roared high and fiercely^ 
blackening the prison wall, and twining up its lofty 
front like burning serpents. At first, they crowded 
round the blaze, and vented their exultation only in 
their looks ; but when it grew hotter and fiercer — when 
it crackled, leaped, and roared, like a great furnace — 
when it shone upon the opposite houses, and lighted up 
not only the pale and wondering faces at the windows, 
but the inmost corners of each habitation — when, 
through the deep red heat and glow, the fire was seen 
sporting and toying with the door, now clinging to its 
obdurate surface, now gliding off with fierce inconstancy 
and soaring high into the sky, anon returning to fold it 
in its burning grasp and lure it to its ruin — when it 
shone and gleamed so brightly that the church clock of 
St. Sepulchre’s, so often pointing to the hour of death, 
was legible as in broad day, and the vane upon its stee- 
ple-top glittered in the unwonted light like something 
richly jewelled — when blackened stone and sombre 
brick grew ruddy in the deep reflection, and windows 
1 shone like burnished gold, dotting the longest distance in 
! the fiery vista with their specks of brightness — when 
wall and tower, and roof and chimney-stack, seemed 
: drunk, and in the flickering glare appeared to reel and 
I stagger — when scores of objects, never seen before, 
I burst out upon the view, and things the most familiar 
put on some new aspect — then the mob began tfl join 
the whirl, and with loud yells, and shouts, and clamor, 
Buch as happily is seldom heard, bestirred themselves to 
^eed the fire, and keep it at its height. 

Although the heat was so intense that the paint on 
the houses over against the prison, parched and <;rackled 


100 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


up, and swelling into boils, as it were, from excess of 
torture, broke and crumbled away ; although the glass 
fell from the window-sashes, and the lead and iron on 
the roofs blistered the incautious hand that touched 
them, and the sparrows in the eaves took wing, and ren- 
dered giddy by the smoke, fell fluttering down upon the 
blazing pile ; still the fire was tended unceasingly by 
busy hands, and round it, men were going always. 
They never slackened in their zoal, or kept aloof, but 
pressed upon the flames so hard, that those in front had 
much ado to save themselves from being thrust in ; if 
one man swooned or dropped, a dozen struggled for his 
place, and that, although they knew the pain, and thirst, 
and pressure to be unendurable. Those who fell down 
in fainting-fits, and were not crushed or burnt, were car- 
ried to an inn-yard close at hand, and dashed with water 
from a pump ; of which buckets full were passed from 
man to man among the crowd ; but such was the strong 
desire of all to drink, and such the fighting to be first, 
that, for the most part, the whole contents were spilled 
upon the ground, without the lips of one man being 
moistened. 

Meanwhile, and in the midst of all the roar and out- 
cry, those who were nearest to the pile, heaped up again 
the burning fragments that came toppling down, and 
raked the fire about the door, which, although a sheet of 
flame, was still a door fast locked and barred, and kept 
them •out. Great pieces of blazing wood w'ere passed, 
besides, above the people’s heads to such as stood about 
the ladders, and some of these, climbing up to the top- 
most stave, and holding on with one hand by the prison 
wall, exei'ted all their skill and force to cast these fire- 
brands on the roof, or down into the yards within. In 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


101 


many instances their efforts were successful ; which oc- 
casioned a new and appalling addition to the horrors of 
the scene ; for the prisoners within, seeing from between 
their bars that the fire caught in many places and 
thrived fiercely, and being all locked up in strong cells 
for the night, began to know that they were in danger 
of being burnt alive. This terrible fear, spreading from 
cell to cell, and from yard to yard, vented itself in such 
dismal cries and wailiags, and in such dreadful shrieks 
for help, that the whole jail resounded with the noise ; 
which was loudly heard even above the shouting of the 
mob and roaring of the flames, and was so full of agony 
and despair, that it made the boldest tremble. 

It was remarkable that these cries began in that quar- 
ter of the jail which fronted Newgate Street, where 
it was well known, the men who were to suffer death on 
Thursday were confined. And not only were these 
four who had so short a time to live, the first to whom 
the dread of being burnt occurred, but they were, 
throughout, the most importunate of all : for they could 
be plainly heard, notwithstanding the great thickness of 
the walls, crying that the wind set that way, and that 
the flames would shortly reach them ; and calling to the 
ofiftcers of the jail to come and quench the fire from a 
cistern which was in their yard, and full of water. 
Judging from what the crowd without the walls could 
I hear from time to time, these four doomed wretches 
never ceased to call for help ; and that with as much dis- 
traction, and in as great a frenzy of attachment to exist- 
ence, as though each had an honored, happy life before 
him, instead of eight-and-forty hours of miserable im- 
i prisonment, and then a violent and shameful death. 
But the anguish and suffering of the two sons of one 


102 


BARNABY RUDGE 


of these men, when they heard, or fancied that they 
heard, their father’s voice, is past description. After 
wringing their hands and rushing to and fro as if they 
were st^k mad, one mounted on the shoulders of his 
brother, and tried to clamber up the face of the high 
wall, guarded at the top with spikes and points of iron. 
And when he fell among the crowd, he was not deterred 
by his bruises, but mounted up again, and fell again, and, 
when he found the feat impossible, began to beat the 
stones and tear them with his hands, as if he could that 
way make a breach in the strong building, and force a 
passage in. At last, they cleft their way among the mob 
about the door, though many men, a dozen times their 
match, had tried in vain to do so, and were seen, in — 
yes, in — the fire, striving to prize it down, with crow- 
bars. 

Nor were they alone affected by the outcry from with- 
in the prison. The women who were looking on, 
shrieked loudly, beat their hands together, stopped their 
ears ; and many fainted : the men who were not near 
the walls and active in the siege, rather than do nothing, 
tore up the pavement of the street, and did so with a 
haste and fury they could not have surpassed if that had 
been the jail, and they were near their object. Not one 
living creature in the throng was for an instant still. 
The whole great mass were mad. 

A shout ! Another ! Another yet, though few knew 
why, or what it meant. But those around the gate 
had seen it slowly yield, and drop from its topmost 
binge. It hung on that side by but one, but it was up- 
right still, because of the bar, and its having sunk, of 
Its own weight, into the heap of ashes at its foot. There 
was now a gap at the top of the door-way, through which 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


103 


could be descried a gloomy passage, cavernous and dark. 
Pile up the fire ! 

It burnt fiercely. The door was red-hot, and the 
gap wider. They vainly tried to shield their faces with 
their hands, and standing as if in readiness for a spring, 
watched the place. Dark figures, some crawling on 
I their hands and knees, some carried in the arms of 

i others, were seen to pass along the roof. It was plain 

the jail could hold out no longer. The keeper, and his 
officers, and their wives and children, were escaping. 
Pile up the fire ! 

jj The door sank down again : it settled deeper in the 
cinders — tottered — yielded — was down ! 

As they shouted again, they fell back, for a moment, 
and left a clear space about the fire that lay between 
them and the jail entry. Hugh leaped upon the blaz- 
ing. heap, and scattering a train of sparks into the air, 
and making the dark lobby glitter with those that hung 
, upon his dress, dashed into the jail. 

1 The hangman followed. And then so many rushed 
I upon their track, that the fire got trodden down and 
I thinly strewn about the street ; but there was no need 
E of it now, for, inside and out, the prison was in flames. 


K>4 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


CHAPTER LXV. 

Ddeing the whole course of the terrible scene whici 
WB.S now at its height, one man in the jail suffered 
degree of fear and mental torment which had no par* 
allel in the endurance even of those who lay undei 
sentence of death. 

When the rioters first assembled before the building, 
the murderer was roused from sleep — if such slumbers 
as his may have that blessed name — by the roar of 
voices, and the struggling of a great crowd. He started 
up as these sounds met his ear, and sitting on his bed- 
stead, listened. 

After a short interval of silence the noise burst out 
again. Still listening attentively, he made out, in 
course of time, that the jail was besieged by a furious 
multitude. His guilty conscience instantly arrayed these 
men against himself, and brought the fear upon him 
that he would be singled out, and torn to pieces. 

Once impressed with the terror of this conceit, every- 
thing tended to confirm and strengthen it. His double 
crime, the circumstances under which it had been com- 
mitted, the length of time that had elapsed, and its dis- 
covery in spite of all, made him as if it were, the visible 
object of the Almighty’s wrath. In all the crime and 
vice and moral gloom of the great pest-house of the 
capital, he stood alone, marked and singled out by his 
gi'eat guilt, a Lucifer among the devils. The other 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


105 


prisoners were a host, hiding and sheltering each other 
— a crowd like that without the walls. He was one 
man against the whole united concourse ; a single, soli- 
tary lonely man, from whom the very captives in the 
jail fell off and shrunk appalled. 

It might be that the intelligence of his capture hav- 
ing been bruited abroad, they had come there pur- 
posely to drag him out and kill him in the street ; or 
it might be that they were the rioters, and, in pur- 
suance of an old design, had come to sack the prison. 
But in either case he had no belief or hope that they 
would spare him. Every shout they raised, and every 
^ound they made, was a blow upon his heart. As the 
attack went on, he grew more wild and frantic in his 
terror : tried to pull away the bars that guarded the 
chimney and prevented him from climbing up : called 
loudly on the turnkeys to cluster round the cell and 
save him from the fury of the rabble ; or put him in 
some dungeon underground, no matter of what depth, 
how dark it was, or loathsome, or beset with rats and 
creeping things, so that it hid him and was hard to 
find. 

But no one came, or answered him. Fearful, even 
while he cried to them, of attracting attention, he was 
silent. By and by, he saw, as he looked from his 
grated window, a strange glimmering on the stone walls 
and pavement of the yard. It was feeble at first, and 
came and went, as though some officers with torches 
were passing to and fro upon the roof of the prison. 
Soon it reddened, and lighted brands came whirling 
down, spattering the ground with fire, and burning sul- 
lenly in corners. One rolled beneath a wooden bench, 
and set it in a blaze ; another caught a water-spout, and 


106 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


BO went climbing up the wall, leaving a long straight 
track of fire behind it. After a time, a slow thick 
shower of burning fragments, from some upper portion 
of the prison which was blazing nigh, began to fall be- 
fore his door. Remembering that it opened outwards, 
he knew that every spark which fell upon the heap 
and in the act lost its bright life, and died an ugly 
speck of dust and rubbish, helped to entomb him in 
a living grave. Still, though the jail resounded with 
shrieks and cries for help, — though the fire bounded 
up as if each separate fiame had had a tiger’s life, and 
roared as though, in every one, there were a hungry 
voice — though the heat began to grow intense, and the 
air suffocating, and the clamor without increased, and 
the danger of his situation even from one merciless 
element was every moment more extreme, — still he 
was afraid to raise his voice again, lest the crowd should 
break in, and should, of their own ears or from the in- 
formation given them by the other prisoners, get the 
clew to his place of confinement. Thus fearful alike, 
of those within the prison and of those without ; of noise 
and silence ; light and darkness ; of being released, and 
being left there to die ; he was so tortured and tor- 
mented, that nothing man has ever done to man in the 
horrible caprice of power and cruelty, exceeds his self- 
inflicted punishment. 

Now, now, the door was down. Now they came rush- 
ing through the jail, calling to each other in the vaulted 
passages ; clashing the iron gates dividing yard from 
yard ; beating at the doors of cells and wards ; wrench- 
ing off bolts and locks and bars ; tearing down the door- 
posts to get men out ; endeavoring to drag them by 
main force through gaps and windows where a child 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


107 


could scarcely pass ; whooping and yelling without a 
moment’s rest ; and running through the heat and flames 
as if they were cased in metal. By their legs, their 
arms, the hair upon their heads, they dragged the pris- 
oners out. Some threw themselves upon the captives 
as they got towards the door, and tried to file away their 
ii'ons ; some danced about them with a frenzied joy and 
rent their clothes, and were ready, as it seemed, to tear 
them limb from limb. Now a party of a dozen men 
came darting through the yard into which the murderer 
cast fearful glances from his darkened window ; drag- 
ging a prisoner along the ground whose dress they had 
nearly torn from his body in their mad eagerness to 
set him free, and who was bleeding and senseless in 
their hands. Now a score of prisoners ran to and fro, 
who had lost themselves in the intricacies of the prison, 
and were so bewildered with the noise and glare that 
they knew not where to turn or what to do, and still 
cried out for help, as loudly as before. Anon some 
famished wretch whose theft had been a loaf of bread, 
or scrap of butcher’s meat, came skulking past, bare- 
footed — going slowly away because that jail, his house, 
was burning; not because he had any other, or had 
friends to meet, or old haunts to revisit, or any liberty 
to gain, but liberty to starve and die. And then a knot 
of highwaymen went trooping by, conducted by the 
friends they had among the crowd, who muffled their 
fetters as they went along, with handkerchiefs and bands 
of hay, and wrapped them in coats and cloaks, and gave 
them drink from bottles, and held it to their lips, be- 
cause of their handcuffs which there was no time to 
remove. All this, and Heaven knows how much more, 
was done amidst a noise, a hurry, and distraction, like 


108 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


nothing that we know of, even in our dreams ; which 
seemed forever on the rise, and never to decrease for 
the space of a single instant. 

He was still looking down from his window upon 
these things, when a J^and of men with torches, lad- 
ders, axes, and many kinds of weapons, poured into the 
yard, and hammering at his door, inquired if there were 
any prisoner within. He left the Avindow when he saw 
them coming, and drew back into the remotest corner 
of the cell ; but although he returned them no answer, 
they had a fancy that some one was inside, for they 
presently set ladders against it, and began to tear 
away the bars at the casement ; not only that, indeed, 
but with pickaxes to hew down the very stones in the 
wall. 

As soon as they had made a breach at the window, 
large enough for the admission of a man’s head, one of 
them thrust *in a torch and looked all round the room. 
He followed this man’s gaze until it rested on himself, 
and heard him demand why he had not answered, bu* 
made him no reply. 

In the general surprise and wonder, they were used to 
this ; without saying anything more, they enlarged the 
breach until it was large enough to admit the body of a 
man, and then came dropping down upon the floor, one 
after a'nother, until the cell Avas full. They caught him 
up among them, handed him to the AAundovA^, and those 
Avho stood upon the ladders passed him do\A’n upon the 
pavement of the yard. Then the rest came out, one 
After another, and, bidding him fly, and lose no time, or 
the Avay Avould be choked up, hurried aAA'ay to rescue 
others. 

It seemed not a minute’s work from first to last. He 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


109 


Staggered to his feet incredulous of what had happened, 
when the yard was filled again, and a crowd rushed on, 
hurrying Barnaby among them. In another minute—^ 
not so much : another minute ! the same instant, with no 
lapse or interval between ! — he and his son were being 
passed from hand to hand, through the dense crowd in 
the street, and were glancing backward at a burning pile 
which some one said was Newgate. 

From the moment of their first entrance into the 
prison, the crowd dispersed themselves about it, and 
swarmed into every chink and crevice, as if they had a 
perfect acquaintance with its innermost parts, and bore 
in their minds an exact plan of the whole. For this 
immediate knowledge of the place, they were, no doubt, 
in a great degree indebted to the hangman, who stood in 
the lobby, directing some to go this way, some that, and 
some the other ; and who materially assisted in bringing 
about the wonderful rapidity with which the release of 
the prisoners was effected. 

But this functionary of the law reserved one impor- 
tant piece of intelligence, and kept it snugly to himself. 
When he had issued his instructions relative to every 
other part of the building, and the mob were dispersed 
from end to end, and busy at their work, he took u 
bundle of keys from a kind of cupboard in the wall, and 
going by a private passage near the chapel (it joined the 
governor’s house, and was then on fire), betook himself 
to the condemned cells, which were a series of small, 
strong, dismal rooms, opening on a low gallery, guarded, 
at the end at which he entered, by a strong iron wicket, 
and at its opposite extremity by two doors and a thick 
^rate. Having double-locked the wicket, and assured 
nimself that the other entrances were well secured, he 


110 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


sat down on a bench in the gallery, and sucked the head 
of his stick, with an air of the utmost complacency, tran- 
iquillity, and contentment. 

It would have been strange enough, a man’s enjoying 
himself in this quiet manner, while the prison was burn- 
ng, and such a tumult was cleaving the air, though he 
had been outside the walls. But here, in the very heart 
of the building, and moreover with the prayers and cries 
of the four men under sentence sounding in his ears, and 
thoir hands, stretched out through the gratings in their 
cell doors, clasped in frantic entreaty before his very 
eyes, it was particularly remarkable. Indeed, Mr. Den- 
nis appeared to think it an uncommon circumstance, and 
to banter himself upon it ; for he thrust his hat on one 
side as some men do when they are in a waggish humor, 
sucked the head of his stick with a higher relish, and 
smiled as though he would say, “ Dennis, you’re a rum 
dog ; you’re a queer fellow ; you’re capital company, 
Dennis, and quite a character ! ” 

He sat in this way for some minutes, while the four 
men in the cells, certain that somebody had entered the 
gallery, but could not see who, gave vent to such piteous 
entreaties as wretches in their miserable condition may 
be supposed to have been inspired with : urging, who- 
ever it was, to set them at liberty, for the love of Heav- 
en ; and protesting, with great fervor, and truly enough, 
perhaps, for the time, that if they escaped, they would 
amend their ways, and would never, never, never again 
do wrong before God or man, but would lead penitent 
and sober lives, and sorrowfully repent the crimes they 
Vad committed. The terrible energy with which they 
spoke, would have moved any person, no matter how 
good or just (if any good or just person could have 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Ill 


strayed into that sad place that night), to have set them 
at liberty ; and, while he would have left any other pun- 
ishment to its free course, to have saved them from this 
last dreadful and repulsive penalty ; which never turned 
a man inclined to evil, and has hardened thousands who 
were half inclined to good. 

Mr. Dennis, who had been bred and nurtured in the 
good old school, and had administered the good old laws 
on the good old plan, always once and sometimes twice 
every six weeks, for a long time, bore these appeals with 
a deal of philosophy. Being at last, how^ever, rather 
disturbed in his pleasant reflection by their repetition, 
he rapped at one of the doors with his stick, and 
cried : — 

“ Hold your noise there, will you ? ” 

At this they all cried together that they were to be 
hanged on the next day but one ; and again implored 
his aid. 

“ Aid ! For what ! ” said hv. Dennis, playfully rap- 
ping the knuckles of the hand nearest him. 

“ To save us ! ” they cried. 

“ Oh, certainly,” said Mr. Dennis, winking at the wall 
in the absence of any friend with whom he could humor 
the joke. “And so you’re to be worked otF, are you 
brothers ? ” 

“ Unless we are released to-night,” one of them cried, 
“ we are dead men ! ” 

“I tell you what it is,” said the hangman, gravely; 
“ I’m afraid my friend that you’re not in that ’ere state 
of mind that’s suitable to your condition, then ; you’re 
not a-going to be released: don’t think it — Will you 
•eave otF that ’ere indecent row ? I wonder you a’n’t 
tshained of yourselves, I do.” 


112 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


He followed up this reproof by rapping every set of 
knuckles one after the other, and having done so, re- 
sumed his seat again with a cheerful countenance. 

“ You’ve had law^,” he said, crossing his legs and ele- 
vating his eyebrows : “ law's have been made a’ purpose 
for you ; a wery handsome prison’s been made a’ pur- 
pose for you ; a parson’s kept a’ purpose for you ; a con- 
stitootional officer’s appointed a’ purpose for you ; carts 
is maintained a’ purpose for you — and yet you’re not 
contented ! — Will you hold that noise, you sir in the 
farthest ? ” 

A groan w'as the only answer. 

“ So well as I can make out,” said Mr. Dennis, in a 
tone of mingled badinage and remonstrance, “ there’s 
not a man among you. I begin to think I’m on the 
opposite side, and among the ladies ; though for the mat- 
ter of that. I’ve seen a many ladies face it out, in a man- 
ner that did honor to the sex. — You in number two, 
don’t grind them teeth of yours. Worse manners,” said 
the hangman, rapping at the door with his stick, “ I 
never see in this place afore. I’m ashamed on you. 
You’re a disgrace to the Bailey.” 

After pausing for a moment to hear if anything could 
be pleaded in justification, Mr. Dennis resumed in a sort 
of coaxing tone : — 

‘‘ Now look’ee_here, you four. I’m come here to take 
care of you, and see that you a’n’t burnt, instead of the 
other thing. It’s no use your making any noise, for you 
won’t be found out by them as has broken in, and you’ll 
only be hoarse w'hen you come to the speeches, — which 
I's a pity. What I say in respect to the speeches always 
is, ‘ Give it mouth.’ That’s my maxim. Give it moutli. 
I’ve heerd,” said the hangman, pulling off* his hat to take 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


113 


his handkerchief from tlie crown and wipe his face, and 
then putting it on again a little more on one side than 
before, “ I’ve heerd a eloquence on them boards — you 
know what boards I mean — and have heerd a degree 
of mouth given to them speeches, that they was as clear 
as a bell, and as good as a play. There’s a pattern? 
And always, when a thing of this natur’s to come oflf^ 
what I stand up for, is, a proper frame of mind. Let's 
have a proper frame of mind, and we can go through 
with it, creditable — pleasant — sociable. Whatever you 
do, (and I address myself, in particular, to you in the 
farthest), never snivel. I’d sooner by half, though I 
lose by it, see a man tear his clothes a’ purpose to 
spile ’em before they come to me, than find him sniv- 
elling. It’s ten to one a better frame of mind, every 
way ! ” 

While the hangman addressed them to this effect, in 
the tone and with the air of a pastor in familiar conver- 
sation with his flock, the noise had been in some degree 
subdued ; for the rioters were busy in conveying the 
prisoners to the Sessions House, which was beyond the 
main walls of the prison, though connected with it, and 
the crowd were busy too, in passing them from thence 
along the street. But when he had got thus far in his 
discourse, the sound of voices in the yard showed plainly 
that the mob had returned and were coming that way ; 
and directly afterwards a violent crashing at the grate 
below, gave note of their attack upon the cells (as they 
were called) at last. 

It was in vain the hangman ran from door to door, 
'ind covered the grates, one after another, with his hat, 
in futile efforts to stifle the cries of the four men within; 
U was in vain he dogged their outstretched hands, and 
8 


VOl . IH. 


114 


BAENABY RUDGE. 


beat them with his stick, or menaced them wdth new and 
lingering pains in the execution of his office ; the place 
resounded with their cries. These, together wdth the 
feeling that they were now the last men in the jail, so 
worked upon and stimulated the besiegers, that in an 
incredibly short space of time they forced the strong 
grate down below, which was formed of iron rods two 
inches square, drove in the two other doors, as if they 
had been but deal partitions, and stood at the end of 
the gallery with only a bar or two between them and 
the cells. 

“ Holloa ! ” cried Hugh, who was the first to look into 
the dusky passage : “ Dennis before us ! Well done, old 
boy. Be quick, and open here, for we shall be suffocated 
in the smoke, going out.” 

“ Go out at once, then,” said Dennis. “ What do you 
want here ? ” 

“ Want ! ” echoed Hugh. “ The four men.” 

“Four devils!” cried the hangman. “Don’t you know 
they’re left for death on Thursday ? Don’t you respect 
the law — the constitootion — nothing ? Let the four 
men be.” 

“ Is this a time for joking ? ” cried Hugh. “ Do you 
hear ’em ? Pull away these bars that have got fixed 
between the door and the ground ; and let us in.” 

“ Brother,” safd the hangman, in a low voice, as he 
stooped under pretence of doing what Hugh desired, 
but only looked up in his face, “ can’t you leave these 
here four men to me, if I’ve the whim ! You do what 
you like, and have what you like of everything for your 
share, — give me my share. I want these four men left 
^one, I tell you I ” 

“Pull the bars down, or stand out of the way,” waa 
Hugh’s reply. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


115 


“You can turn the crowd if you like, you know 
that well enough, brother,” said the hangman, slowly. 
“ What ! You will come in, will you ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“You won’t let these men alone, and leave ’em to 
me ? You’ve no respect for nothing — haven’t you ? ” 
said the hangman, retreating to the door by which he 
had entered, and regarding his companion with a scowl. 
“ You ^oill come in, will you, brother ! ” 

“ I tell you yes. What the devil ails you ? Where 
are you going ? ” 

“ No matter where I’m going,” rejoined the hangman, 
looking in again at the iron wicket, which he had nearly 
shut upon himself, and held ajar. “ Remember where 
you’re coming. That’s all ! ” 

With that, he shook his likeness at Hugh, and giving 
him a grin, compared with which his usual smile was 
amiable, disappeared and shut the door. 

Hugh paused no longer, but goaded alike by the cries 
of the convicts, and by the impatience of the crowd, 
warned the man immediately behind him — the way 
was only wide enough for one abreast — to stand back, 
and wielded a sledge-hammer with such strength, that 
after a few blows the iron bent and broke, and gave 
them free admittance. 

If the two sons of one of these men, of whom men- 
tion has been made, were furious in their zeal before, 
they had now the wrath and vigor of lions. Calling to 
the man within each cell, to keep as far back as he 
could, lest the axes crashing through the door should 
wound him, a party went to work upon each one, to 
beat it in by sheer strength, and force the bolts and 
staples from their hold. But although these two lads 


116 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


had the weakest party, and the worse armed, and did 
not begin until after the others, having stopped to whis- 
per to him through the grate, that door was the first 
open, and that man the first out. As they dragged him 
into the gallery to knock off his irons, he fell down 
among them, a mere heap of chains, and was carried 
out in that state on men’s shoulders with no sign of 
life. 

The release of these four wretched creatures, and con- 
veying them, astounded and bewildered, into the street 
so full of life — a spectacle they had never thought to 
see again, until they emerged from solitude and silence 
upon that last journey, when the air should be heavy 
with the pent-up breath of thousands, and the streets 
and houses should be built and roofed with human faces, 
not with bricks and tiles and stones — was the crowning 
horror of the scene. Their pale and haggard looks, and 
hollow eyes ; their staggering feet, and hands stretched 
out as if to save themselves from falling ; their wander- 
ing and uncertain air ; the way they heaved and gasped 
for breath, as though in water, when they were first 
plunged into the crowd ; all marked them for the men. 
No need to say “ this one was doomed to die ; ” there 
were the words broadly stamped and branded on his 
face. The crowd fell off, as if they had been laid out 
for burial, and had risen in their shrouds ; and many 
were seen to shudder, as though they had been actually 
dead men, when they chanced to touch or brush against 
their garments. 

At the bidding of the mob, the houses were all illumi- 
nated that night — lighted up from top to bottom as at a 
time of public gayety and joy. Many years afterwards, 
old people who lived in their youth near this part of the 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


117 


city, remembered being in a great glare of light, within 
doors and without, and as they looked, timid and fright- 
ened children, from the windows, seeing a face go by. 
Though the whole great crowd and all its other teri’ors 
had faded from their recollection, this one object re- 
mained ; alone, distinct, and well-remembered. Even 
in the unpractised minds of infants, one of these doomed 
men, darting past, and but an instant seen, was an im- 
age of force enough to dim the whole concourse ; to 
find itself an all-absorbing place, and hold it ever after. 

When this last task had been achieved, the shouts and 
cries grew fainter; the clank of fetters, which had re- 
sounded on all sides as the prisoners escaped, was heard 
no more ; all the noises of the crowd subsided into a 
hoarse and sullen murmur as it passed into the distance ; 
and when the human tide had rolled away, a melancholy 
heap of smoking ruins marked the spot where it had 
lately chafed and roared. 


118 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


CHAPTER LXVL 

Although he had had no rest upon the previous 
night, and had watched with little intermission for some 
weeks past, sleeping only in the day by starts and 
snatches, Mr. Haredale, from the dawn of morning until 
sunset, sought his niece in every place where he deemed 
it possible she could have taken refuge. All day long, 
nothing, save a draught of water, passed his lips; though 
he prosecuted his inquiries far and wide, and never so 
much as sat down, once. 

In every quarter he could think of ; at Chigwell and 
in London ; at the houses of the tradespeople with whom 
he dealt, and of the friends he knew ; he pursued his 
search. A prey to the most harrowing anxieties and 
apprehensions", he went from magistrate to magistrate, 
and finally to the Secretary of State. The only comfort 
he received was from this minister, who assured him that 
the Government, being now driven to the exercise of the 
extreme prerogatives of the Crown, were determined to 
exert them ; that a proclamation would probably be out 
upon the morrow, giving to the military, discretionary 
and unlimited power in the suppression of the riots ; that 
the sympathies of the King, the Administration, and both 
Houses of Parliament, and indeed of all good men of 
every religious persuasion, were strongly with the in- 
jured Catholics ; and that justice should be done them 
at any cost or hazard. He told him, moreover,- that 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


119 


Other persons whose houses had been burnt, had for a 
time lost sight of their children or their relatives, but 
had in every case, within his knowledge, succeeded in 
discovering them ; that his complaint should be remem- 
bered, and fully stated in the instructions given to the 
officers in command, and to all the inferior myrmidons 
of justice ; and that everything that could be done to 
help him, should be done with a good-will and in good 
faith. 

Grateful for this consolation, feeble as it was in its 
reference to the past, and little hope as it afforded him 
in connection with the subject of distress which lay near- 
est to his heart ; and really thankful for the interest the 
minister expressed, and seemed to feel, in his condition ; 
Mr. Haredale withdrew. He found himself with the 
night coming on, alone in the streets ; and destitute of 
any place in which to lay his head. 

He entered an hotel near Charing Cross, and ordered 
some refreshment and a bed. He saw that his faint and 
worn appearance attracted the attention of the landlord 
and his waiters ; and thinking that they might suppose 
him to be penniless, took out his purse, and laid it on the 
table. It was not that, the landlord said, in a faltering 
voice. If he were one of those who had suffered by the 
rioters, he durst not give him entertainment. He had a 
family of children, and had been twice warned to be 
careful in receiving guests. He heartily prayed his 
forgiveness, but what could he do ? 

Nothing. No man felt that more* sincerely than Mr. 
Haredale. He told the man as much, and left the 
house. 

Feeling that he might have anticipated this occur- 
rence, after what he had seen at Chigwell in the mom- 


120 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


ing, where no man dared to touch a spade, though he 
offered a large reward to all who would come and dig 
among the ruins of his house, he walked along the 
Strand ; too proud to expose himself to another re- 
fuel, and of too generous a spirit to involve in dis- 
tress or ruin any honest tradesman who might be weak 
enough to give him shelter. He wandered into one of 
the streets by the side of the river, and was pacing in 
a thoughtful manner up and down, thinking of things 
that had happened long ago, when he heard a servant- 
man at an upper window call to another on the opposite 
side of the street, that the mob were setting fire to New- 
gate. 

To Newgate ! where that man was ! His failing 
strength returned, his energies came back with tenfold 
vigor, on the instant. If it were possible — if they 
should set the murderer free — was he, after- all he 
had undergone, to die with the suspicion of having 
slain his own brother, dimly gathering about him — 

He had no consciousness of going to the jail; but 
there he stood, before it. There was the crowd, wedged 
and pressed together in a dense, dark, moving mass; 
and there were the flames soaring up into the air. His 
head turned round and round, lights flashed before his 
eyes, and he struggled hard wdth two men. 

“ Nay, nay,” said one. “ Be more yourself, my good 
sir. We attract attention here. Come away. What 
can you do among so many men?” 

“ The gentleman^s always for doing something,” said 
die other, forcing him along as he spoke. “ I like him 
for that. I do like him for that.” 

They had by this time got kim into a court, hard by 
the prison. He looked f»’om one to the other, and as he 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


121 


tried to release himself, felt that he tottered on his feet. 
He who had spoken first, was the old gentleman whom 
he had seen at the Lord Major’s. The other was John 
Gruebj, who had stood by him so manfully at West- 
minster. 

What does this mean ? ” he asked them faintly 
“ How came we together ? ” 

“On the skirts of the crowd,” returned the distiller; 
“but come with us. Pray come with us. You seem 
to know my friend here ? ” 

“ Surely,” said Mr. Haredale, looking in a kind of 
stupor at John. 

“ He’ll tell you then,” returned the old gentleman, 
“ that I am a man to be trusted. He’s my servant. He 
was lately (as you know, I have no doubt) in Lord 
George Gordon’s service ; but he left it, and brought, 
in pure good-will to me and others, who are marked by 
the rioters, such intelligence as he had picked up of 
their designs.” 

— “ On one condition, please, sir,” said John, touching 
his hat. “ No evidence against my lord — a misled man 
— a kind-hearted man, sir. My lord never intended 
this.” 

“ The condition will be observed, of course,” rejoined 
the old distiller. “ It’s a point of honor. But come with 
us, sir ; pray come with us.” 

John Grueby added no entreaties, but he adopted a 
different kind of persuasion, by putting his arm through 
cne of Mr. Haredale’s, while his master took the other, 
and leading him away with all speed. 

Sensible, from a strapge lightness in his head, and 
a difficulty in fixing his thoughts on anything, even to 
the extent of bearing his companions in his mind for a 


122 


BARNABY BUDGE. 


minute together without looking at them, that his brain 
was affected by the agitation and suffering tlirough which 
he had passed, and to which he was still a prey, Mr. 
Haredale let them lead him where they would. As they 
went along, he was conscious of having no command over 
what he said or thought, and that he had a fear of going 
mad. 

The distiller lived, as he had told him when they first 
met, on Holborn Hill, where he had great storehouses, 
and drove a large trade. They approached his house by 
a back entrance, lest they should attract the notice of the 
crowd, and went into an upper room which faced towards 
the street ; the windows, however, in common with those 
of every other room in the house, were boarded up in- 
side, in order, that, out of doors, all might appear quite 
dark. 

They laid him on a sofa in this chamber, perfectly in- 
sensible ; but John immediately fetching a surgeon, who 
took from him a large quantity of blood, he gradually 
came to himself. As he was, for the time, too weak to 
walk, they had no difficulty in persuading him to remain 
there all night, and got him to bed without loss of a 
minute. That done, they gave him cordial and some 
toast, and presently a pretty strong composing-draught, 
under the influence of which he soon fell into a lethargy, 
and, for a time, forgot his troubles. 

The vintner, who was a very hearty old fellow and a 
worthy man, had no thoughts of going to bed himself, for 
he had received several threatening warnings from the 
rioters, and had indeed gone out that evening to try and 
gather from the conversation of the mob whether his 
house was to be the next attacked. He sat all night in 
an easy-chair in the same room — dozing a little now 


barnaby rudge. 


123 


and then — and received from time to time the reports 
of John Grueby and two or three other trustworthy 
persons in his employ, who went out into the streets as 
scouts; and for whose entertainment an ample allowance 
of good cheer (which the old vintner, despite his anxiety, 
now and then attacked himself) was set forth in an ad- 
joining chamber. 

These accounts were of a sufficiently alarming nature 
from the first ; but as the night wore on, they grew so 
much worse, and involved such a fearful amount of riot 
and destruction, that in comparison with these new tid- 
ings all the previous disturbances sunk to nothing. 

The first intelligence that came, was of the taking of 
Newgate, and the escape of all the prisoners, whose 
track, as they made up Holborn and into the adjacent 
streets, was proclaimed to those citizens who were shut 
up in their houses, by the rattling of their chains, which 
formed a dismal concert, and was heard in every direc- 
tion, as though so many forges were at work. The 
flames too, shone so brightly through the vintner’s sky- 
lights, that the rooms and staircases below were nearly 
as light as in broad day ; while the distant shouting of 
the mob seemed to shake the very walls and ceilings. 

At length they were heard approaching the house, and 
^ some minutes of terrible anxiety ensued. They came 
close up, and stopped before it ; but after giving three 
loud yells, went on. And although they returned sev- 
eral times that night, creating new alarms each time, 
they did nothing there ; having their hands full. Shortly 
after they had gone away for the first time, one of the 
scouts came running in with the news that they had 
stopped before Lord Mansfield’s house in Bloomsbury 
Square. 


124 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Soon afterwards there came another, and another, and 
then the first returned again, and so, by little and little, 
their tale was this : — That the mob gathering round 
Lord Mansfield’s house, had called on those within to 
open the door, and receiving no reply (for Lord and 
Lady Mansfield were at that moment escaping by the 
back-way), forced an entrance according to their usual 
custom. That they then began to demolish the house 
with great fury, and setting fire to it in several parts, 
involved in a common ruin the whole of the costly furni- 
ture, the plate and jewels, a beautiful gallery of pictures, 
the rarest collection of manuscripts ever possessed by 
any one private person in the world, and worse than all, 
because nothing could replace this loss, the great Law 
Library, on almost every page of which were notes in 
the Judge’s own hand, of inestimable value, — being the 
results of the study and experience of his whole life. 
That while they were howling and exulting round the 
fire, a troop of soldiers, with a magistrate among them, 
came up, and being too late (for the mischief was by that 
time done), began to disperse the crowd. That the riot 
act being read, and the crowd still resisting, the soldiers 
received orders to fire, and levelling their muskets shot 
dead at the first discharge six men and a woman, and 
wounded many persons ; and loading again directly, fired 
another volley, but over the people’s heads it was sup- 
posed, as none were seen to fall. That thereupon, and 
daunted by the shrieks and tumult, the crowd began to 
disperse, and the soldiers went away, leaving the killed 
and wounded on the ground : which they had no sooner 
done than the rioters came back again, and taking up the 
dead bodies, and the wounded people, formed into a rude 
orocession, having the bodies in the front. That in this 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


125 


order, they paraded off with a horrible merriment ; fixing 
weapons in the dead men’s hands to make them look as 
if alive ; and preceded by a fellow ringing Lord Mans- 
field’s dinner-bell with all his might. 

The scouts reported further, that this party meeting 
with some others who had been at similar work else- 
where, they all united into one, and drafting off a few 
men with the killed and wounded, marched away to 
Lord Mansfield’s country-seat at Caen Wood, betw^een 
Hampstead and Highgate; bent upon destroying that 
house likewise, and lighting up a great fire there, w'hich 
from that height should be seen all over London. But 
in this they were disappointed, for a party of horse hav- 
ing arrived before them, they retreated faster than they 
went, and came straight back 'to town. 

There being now a great many parties in the streets, 
each went to work according to its humor, and a dozen 
houses were quickly blazing, including those of Sir John 
Fielding and two other justices, and four in Holborn — 
one of the greatest thoroughfares in London — which 
were all burning at the same time, and burned until they 
went out of themselves, for the people cut the engine 
hose, and would not suffer the firemen to play upon the 
flames. At one house near Moorfields, they found in 
one of the rooms some canary birds in cages, and these 
they cast into the fire alive. The poor little creatures 
screamed, it was said, like infants, when they were flung 
upon the blaze ; and one man was so touched that he 
tried in vain to save them, which roused the indignation 
of the crowd, and nearly cost him his life. 

At this same house, one of the fellows who went 
through the rooms, breaking the furniture and helping to 
destroy the building, found a child’s doll — a poor toy — 


126 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


which he exhibited at the window to the mob below, as 
the image of some unholy saint which the late occupants 
had worshipped. While he was doing this, another man 
with an equally tender conscience (they had both been 
foremost in throwing down the canary birds for roasting 
alive), took his seat on the parapet of the house, and 
harangued the crowd from a pamphlet circulated by the 
Association, relative to the true principles of Christian- 
ity ! Meanwhile the Lord Mayor, with his hands in his 
pockets, looked on as an idle man might look at any 
other show, and seem mightily satisfied to have got a 
good place. 

Such were the accounts brought to the old vintner by 
his servants as he sat at the side of Mr. Haredale’s bed, 
having been unable even to doze, after the first pai’t of 
the night ; too much disturbed by his own fears ; by the 
cries of the mob, the light of the fires, and the firing of 
the soldiers. Such, with the addition of the release of 
all the prisoners in the New Jail at Clerkenwell, and as 
many robberies of passengers in the streets, as the crowd 
had leisure to indulge in, were the scenes of which Mr. 
Haredale was happily unconscious, and which were al) 
enacted before midnight. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


127 


CHAPTER LXVII. 

When darkness ‘broke away and morning began to 
dawn, the town wore a strange aspect indeed. 

Sleep had scarcely been thought of all night. The 
general alarm was so apparent in the faces of the in- 
habitants, and its expression was so aggravated by want 
of rest (few persons, with any property to lose, having 
dai‘ed to go to bed since Monday), that a stranger com- 
ing into the streets would have supposed some mortal 
pest or plague to have been raging. In place of the 
usual cheerfulness and animation of mornings everything 
was dead and silent. The shops remained unclosed, 
oflSces and warehouses were shut, the coach and chair 
stands were deserted, no carts or wagons rumbled 
through the slowly waking streets, the early cries were 
all hushed; a universal gloom prevailed. Great num- 
bers of people were out, even at daybreak, but they 
flitted to and fro as though they shrank from the sound 
of their own footsteps; the public ways were haunted 
rather than frequented ; and round the smoking ruins 
people stood a^art from one another and in silence, not 
venturing to condemn the rioters, or to be supposed to 
do so, even in whispers. 

At the Lord President’s in Piccadilly, at Lambeth 
Palace, at the Lord Cliancellor’s in Great ’Ormond 
Street, in the Royal Exchange, the Bank, the Guildhall, 
the Inns of Court, the Courts of Law, and every cham- 


128 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


ber fronting the streets near Westminster Hall and the 
Houses of Parliament, parties of soldiers were posted 
before daylight. A body of Horse- Guards paraded 
Palace-yard ; an encampment was formed in the Park, 
where fifteen hundred men and five battalions of Militia 
were under arms; the Tower was fortified, the draw- 
bridges were raised, the cannon loaded and pointed, and 
two regiments of artillery busied in* strengthening the 
fortress and preparing it for defence. A numerous de- 
tachment of soldiers were stationed to keep guard at the 
New-River Head, which the people had threatened to 
attack, and where, it was said, they meant to cut off the 
main-pipes, so that there might be no water for the ex- 
tinction of the flames. In the Poultry, and on Cornhill, 
and at several other leading points, iron chains were 
drawn across the street ; parties of soldiers were distrib- 
uted in some of the old city churches while it was yet 
dark ; and in several private houses (among them Lord 
Rockingham’s in Grosvenor Square) ; which were block- 
^ aded as though to sustain a siege, and had guns pointed 
from the windows. When the sun rose, it shone into 
handsome apartments filled with armed men ; the furni- 
ture hastily heaped away in corners, and made of little 
or no account, in the terror of the time — on arms glit- 
tering in city chambers, among desks and stools, and 
dusty books — into little smoky church-yards in odd 
lanes and by-ways, with soldiers lying dovfrn among the 
tombs, or lounging under the shade of the one old tree, 
and their pile of muskets sparkling in the light — on 
folitary sentries pacing up and down in court-yards, 
silent now, but yesterday resounding with the din and 
hum of business — everywhere on guard-rooms, gar- 
risons, and threatening preparations. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


129 


As the day crept on, still more unusual sights were 
witnessed in the streets. The gates of the King’s Bench 
and Fleet Prisons being opened at the usual hour, were 
found to have notices affixed to them, announcing that 
the rioters would come that night to burn them down. 
The Wardens, too well knowing the likelihood there 
was of this promise being fulfilled, were fain to set their 
prisoners at liberty, and give them leave to move their 
goods; so, all day, such of them as had any furniture 
were occupied in conveying it, some to this place, some 
to that, and not a few to the brokers’ shops, where they 
gladly sold it for any wretched price those gentry chose 
to give. There were some broken men among these 
debtors who had been in jail so long, and were so miser- 
able and destitute of friends, so dead to the world, and 
utterly forgotten and uncared for, that they implored 
their jailers not to set them free, and to send them, if 
need were, to some other place of custody. But they, 
refusing to comply, lest they should incur the anger of 
the mob, turned them into the streets, where they wan- 
dered up and down hardly remembering the ways un- 
ti’odden by their feet so long, and crying — such abject 
things those rotten-hearted jails had made them — as 
they slunk off in their rags, and dragged their slipshod 
feet along the pavement. 

Even of the three hundred prisoners who had escaped 
fiom Newgate, there were some — a few, but there 
were some — who sought their jailers out and delivered 
themselves up : preferring imprisonment and punishment 
to the horrors of such another night as the last. Many 
of the convicts, drawn back to their old place of cap- 
tivity by some indescribable attraction, or by a desire 
to exult over it in its downfall and glut their revenge 

VOL. III. 9 


130 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


by seeing it in ashes, actually went back in broad noon 
and loitered about the cells. Fifty were retaken at one 
time on this next day, within the prison walls ; but their 
fate did not deter others, for''there they went in spite 
of everything, and there they were taken in twos and 
threes, twice or thrice a day, all through the week. 
Of the fifty just mentioned, some were occupied in 
endeavoring to rekindle the fire ; but in general they 
seemed to have no object in view but to prowl and 
lounge about the old place ; being often found asleep 
in the ruins, or sitting talking there, or even eating and 
drinking, as in a choice retreat. 

Besides the notices on the gates of the Fleet and the 
King’s Bench, many similar announcements were left, 
before one o’clock at noon, at the houses of private in- 
dividuals ; and further, the mob proclaimed their inten- 
tion of seizing on the Bank, the Mint, the Arsenal at 
Woolwich, and the Royal Palaces. The notices were 
seldom delivered by more than one man, who, if it 
were at a shop, went in, and laid it, with a bloody 
threat perhaps, upon the counter ; or if it were at a 
private house, knocked at the door, and thrust it in 
the servant’s hand. Notwithstanding the presence of 
the military in every quarter of the town, and the 
great force in the Park, these messengers did their 
errands with impunity all through the day. So did 
two boys who went down Holborn alone, armed with 
bars taken from the railings of Lord Mansfield’s house, 
and demanded money for the rioters. So did a tall 
man on horseback who made a collection for the same 
purpose in Fleet Street, and refused to take anything 
but* gold. 

A rumor had now got into circulation, too, which 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


131 


diffused a greater dread all through London, even than 
these publicly announced intentions of the rioters, though 
all men knew that if they were successfully effected, 
there must ensue a national bankruptcy and general 
ruin. It was said that they meant to throw the gates 
of Bedlam open, and let all the madmen loose. This 
suggested such dreadful images to the people’s minds, 
and was in deed and act so fraught with new and un- 
imaginable horrors in the contemplation, that it beset 
them more than any loss or cruelty of which they could 
foresee the worst, and drove many sane men nearly 
mad themselves. 

So the day passed on : the prisoners moving their 
goods; people running to and fro in the streets, carry- 
ing away their property ; groups standing in silence 
round the ruins ; all business suspended ; and the sol- 
diers disposed as has been already mentioned, remaining 
quite inactive. So the day passed on, and dreaded night 
drew near again. 

At last, at seven o’clock in the evening, the privy 
council issued a solemn proclamation that it was now 
necessary to employ the military, and that the officers 
had most direct and effectual orders, by an immediate 
exertion of their utmost force to repress the distur- 
bances; and warning all good subjects of the king to 
keep themselves, their servants, and apprentices, with- 
in doors that night. There was then delivered out tc 
every soldier on duty, thirty-six rounds of powder and 
ball ; the drums beat ; and the whole force was under 
arms at sunset. 

The city authorities, stimulated by those vigorous 
measures, held a common council; passed a vote thank- 
ing the military associations who had tendered their 


132 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


aid to the civil authorities ; accepted il ; and placed them 
under the direction of the two sheriffs. At the queeffs 
palace, a double guard, the yeomen on duty, the groom- 
porters, and all other attendants, were stationed in the 
passages and on the staircases at seven o’clock, with 
strict instructions to be watchful on their posts all night ; 
and all the doors were locked. The gentlemen of the 
Temple, and the other Inns, mounted guard within their 
gates, and strengthened them with the great stones of the 
pavement, which they took up for the purpose. In Lin- 
coln’s Inn, they gave up the hall and commons to the 
Northumberland militia, under the command of Lord 
Algernon Percy ; in some few of the city wards, the 
burgesses turned out, and without making a very fierce 
show, looked brave enough. Some hundreds of stout 
gentlemen threw themselves, armed to the teeth, into 
the halls of the different companies, double-locked and 
bolted all the gates, and dared the rioters (among them 
selves) to come on at their peril. These arrangements 
being all made simultaneously, or nearly so, were com- 
pleted by the time it got dark ; and then the streets 
were comparatively clear, and were guarded at all the 
great corners and chief avenues by the troops: while 
parties of the officers rode up and down in all direc- 
tions, ordering chance stragglers home, and admonish- 
ing the residents to keep within their houses, and, if any 
bring ensued, not to approach the windows. More chains 
were drawn across such of the thoroughfares as were of 
a nature to favor the approach ■'f a great crowd, and 
at each of these points a considerable force was sta- 
tioned. All these precautions having been taken and 
it being now quite dark, those in comma n I awaited th-^ 
result in some anxiety : and not without a hope that 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


133 


Buch vigilant demonstrations might of themselves dis- 
hearten the populace, and prevent any new outrages. 

But in this reckoning they were cruelly mistaken, for 
in half an hour, or less, as though the setting in of night 
had been their preconcerted signal, the rioters having 
previously, in small parties, prevented the lighting of 
the street-lamps, rose like a great sea ; and that in so 
many places at once, and with such inconceivable fury, 
that those who had the direction of the troops knew 
not, at first, where to turn or what to do. One after an- 
other, new fires blazed up in every quarter of the town, 
as though it were the intention of the insurgents to wrap 
the city in a circle of flames, which, contracting by 
degrees, should burn the whole to ashes ; the crowd 
swarmed and roared in every street; and none but 
rioters and soldiers being out of doors, it seemed to the 
latter as if all London were arrayed against them, and 
they stood alone against the town. 

In two hours, six-and-thirty fires were raging — 
six-and-thirty great conflagrations. Among them the 
Borough Clink in Tooley-street, the King’s Bench, the 
Fleet, and the New Bridewell. In almost every street, 
there was a battle; and in every quarter the muskets 
of the troops were heard above the shouts and tumult 
of the mob. The firing began in the Poultry, where 
the chain was drawn across the road, where nearly a 
score of people were killed on the first discharge. Their 
bodies having been hastily carried into St. Mildred’s 
church by the soldiers, the latter fired again, and fol- 
lowing fast upon the crowd, who began to give way 
when they saw the execution that was done, formed 
across Cheapside, and charged them at the point of the 
bayonet. 


134 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


The streets were now a dreadful spectacle. The 
shouts of the rabble, the shrieks of women, the cries 
of the wounded, and the constant firing formed a deafen- 
ing and an awful accompaniment to the sights which 
every corner presented. Wherever the road was ob- 
structed by the chains, there the fighting and the loss 
of life were greatest ; but there was hot work and blood- 
shed in almost every leading thoroughfare. 

At Holborn Bridge, and on Holborn Hill, the con- 
fusion was greater than in any other part ; for the crowd 
that poured out of the city in two great streams, one 
by Ludgate Hill, and one by Newgate-street, united at 
that spot, and formed a mass so dense, that at every 
volley the people seemed to fall in heaps. At this place 
a large detachment of soldiery were posted, who fired, 
now up Fleet Market, now up Holborn, now up Snow 
Hill — constantly raking the streets in each direction. 
At this place too, several large fires were burning, so 
that all the terrors of that terrible night seemed to be 
concentrated in one spot. 

Full twenty times, the rioters, headed by one man 
who wielded an axe in his right hand, and bestrode a 
brewer’s horse of great size and strength, caparisoned 
with fetters taken out of Newgate, which clanked and 
jingled as he went, made an attempt to force a pas- 
sage at this point, and fire the vintner’s house. Full 
twenty times they were repulsed with loss of life, and 
still came back again : and though the fellow at their 
head was marked and singled out by all, and was a 
conspicuous object as the only rioter on horseback, not 
a man could hit him. So surely as the smoke cleared 
\^way, so surely there was he ; calling hoarsely to his 
rorapanions, brandishing his axe above his head, and 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


l3o 

dashing on as though he bore a charmed life, and was 
proof against ball and powder. 

This man was Hugh ; and in every part of the riot, 
he was seen. He headed two attacks upon the Bank, 
helped to break- open the Toll-houses on Blackfriai's 
Bridge, and cast the money into the street: fired two 
of the prisons with his own hand : was here, and there, 
and everywhere — always foremost — always active — 
striking at the soldiers, cheering on the crowd, making 
his horse’s iron music heard through all the yell and up- 
roar : but never hurt or stopped. Turn him at one place, 
and he made a new struggle in another ; force him to 
retreat at this point, and he advanced on that, directly. 
Driven from Holborn for the twentieth time, he rode 
at the head of a great crowd straight upon Saint Paul’s, 
attacked a guard of soldiers who kept watch over a 
body of prisoners wdthin the iron railings, forced them 
to retreat, rescued the men they had in custody, and 
with this accession to his party, came back again, mad 
with liquor and excitement, and hallooing them on like 
a demon. 

It would have been no easy task for the most careful 
rider to sit a horse in the midst of such a throng and 
tumult ; but though this madman rolled upon his back 
(he had no saddle) like a boat upon the sea, he never 
for an instant lost his seat, or failed to guide him where 
he would. Through the very thickest of the press, over 
dead bodies and burning fragments, now on the pave- 
ment, now in the road, now riding up a flight of steps 
to make himself the more conspicuous to his party, and 
now forcing a passage through a mass of human beings, 
60 closely squeezed together that it seemed as if the edge 
of a knife wmuld scarcely part them, — on he went, as 


136 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


though he could surmount all obstacles by the mere ex- 
ercise of his will. And perhaps his not being shot was 
in some degree attributable to this very circumstance : 
for his extreme audacity, and the conviction that he 
must be one of those to whom the proclamation referred, 
inspired the soldiers with a desire to take him alive, and 
diverted many an aim which otherwise might have been 
more near the mark. 

The vintner and Mr. Haredale, unable to sit quietly 
listening to the noise without seeing what went on, had 
climbed to the roof of the house, and hiding behind a 
stack of chimneys, were looking cautiously down into 
the street, almost hoping that after so many repulses the 
rioters would be foiled, when a great shout proclaimed 
that a party were coming round the other way ; and the 
dismal jingling of those accursed fetters warned them 
next moment that they too were led by Hugh. The 
soldiers had advanced into Fleet Market and were dis- 
persing the people there ; so that they came on with 
hardly any check, and were soon before the house. 

“ All’s over now,” said the vintner. “ Fifty thousand 
pounds will be scattered in a minute. We must save 
ourselves. We can do no more, and shall have reason 
to be thankful if we do as much.” 

Their first impulse was, to clamber along the roofs 
of the houses, and, knocking at some garret-window for 
admission, pass down that way into the street, and so es-. 
cape. But another fierce cry from below, and a general 
upturning of the faces of the crowd, apprised them that 
they were discovered, and even that Mr. Haredale was 
recognized ; for Hugh, seeing him plainly in the bright 
glare of the fire, which in that part made it as light as 
day, called to him by his name, and swore to have his 
Ufe. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


137 


“ Leave nre here,” said Mr. Haredale, “ and in Heav- 
en’s name, my good friend, save yourself! Come on ! ” 
he muttered, as he turned towards Hugh and faced him 
without any further effort at concealment : “ This roof is 
high, and if we close, we will die together ! ” 

“Madness,” said the honest vintner, pulling him back, 
“ sheer madness. Hear reason, sir. My good sir, hear 
reason. I could never make myself heard by knocking 
at a window now ; and even if I could, no one would be 
bold enough to connive at my escape. Through the cel- 
lars, there’s a kind of passage into the back street by 
which we roll casks in and out. We shall have time to 
get down there, before they can force an entry. Do not 
delay an instant, but come with me — for both our sakesi 
— for mine — my dear good sir ! ” 

As he spoke, and drew Mr. Haredale back, they had 
both a glimpse of the street. It was but a glimpse, but 
it showed them the crowd, gathering and clustering round 
the house : some of the armed men pressing to the front 
to break down the doors and windows, some bringing 
brands from the nearest fire, some with lifted faces fol- 
lowing their course upon the roof and pointing them out 
to their companions : all raging and roaring like the 
flames they lighted up. They saw some men thirsting 
for the treasures of strong liquor which they knew were 
stored within ; they saw others, who had been wounded, 
sinking down into the opposite doorways and dying, sol- 
itary wretches, in the midst of all the vast assemblage ; 
here, a frightened woman trying to escape ; and there a 
lost child ; and there a drunken ruffian, unconscious of 
the death-wound on his head, raving and fighting to the 
last. All these things, and even such trivial incidents 
as a man with his hat off, or turning round, or stooping 


158 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


down, or shaking hands with another, they marked 
distinctly ; yet in a glance so brief, that, in the act of 
stepping back, they lost the whole, and saw but the pale 
faces of each other, and the red sky above them. 

Mr. Haredale yielded to the entreaties of his com- 
panion — more because -he was resolved to defend him, 
than for any thought he had of his own life, or any care 
he entertained for his own safety — and quickly reen- 
tering the house, they descended the stairs together. 
Loud blows were thundering on the shutters, crowbars 
were already thrust beneath the door, the glass fell 
from the sashes, a deep light slmne through every crev- 
ice, and they heard the voices of the foremost in the 
crowd so close to every chink and key-hole, that they 
seemed to be hoarsely whispering their threats into their 
very ears. They had but a moment reached the bottom 
of the cellar-steps and shut the door behind them, when 
the mob broke in. 

The vaults w'ere profoundly dark, and having no torch 
or candle — for they had been afraid to carry one, lest 
it should betray their place of refuge — they were 
obliged to grope with their hands. But they were not 
long without liglit, for they had not gone far when they 
heard the crowd forcing the door ; and, looking back 
among the low-arched passages, could see them in the 
distance, hurrying to and fro with flashing links, broach- 
ing the casks, staving the great vats, turning off upon 
the right hand and the left, into the different cellars, and 
lying down to drink at the channels of strong spirits 
which w’ere already flowing on the ground. 

They hurried on, not the less quickly for this ; and 
Iiad reached tlie only vault which lay between them and 
the passage out, when suddenly, from the direction in 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


139 


which tliey .were going, a strong light gleamed upon 
their faces ; and before they could slip aside, or turn 
back, or hide themselves, two men (one bearing a torch) 
came upon them, and cried in an astonished whisper, 
‘‘ Here they are ! ” 

At the same instant they pulled off what they wore 
upon tbeir heads. Mr. Haredale saw before him Ed- 
ward Chester, and then saw, when the vintner gasped 
his name, Joe Willet. 

Ay, the same Joe, though with an arm the less, who 
used to make the quarterly journey on the gray mare 
to pay the bill to the purple-faced vintner ; and that 
very same purple-faced vintner, formerly of Thames 
Street, now looked him in the face, and challenged him 
by name. 

Give me- your hand,” said Joe softly, taking it 
whether the astonished vintner would or no. “ Don’t 
fear to shake it ; it’s a friendly one and a hearty one, 
though it has no fellow. Why, how well you look and 
how bluff you are ! And you — God bless you, sir. 
Take heart, take heart. We’ll find them. Be of good 
cheer ; we have not been idle.” 

There was something so honest and frank in Joe’s 
speech, that Mr. Haredale put his hand in his involun- 
tarily, though their meeting was suspicious enough. But 
his glance at Edward Chester, and that gentleman’s 
keeping aloof, were not lost upon Joe, who said bluntly, 
glancing at Edward while he spoke : — 

“ Times are changed, Mr. Haredale, and times have 
come when we ought to know friends from enemies, 
and make no confusion of names. Let me tell you 
that but for this gentleman, you would most likely 
have been dead by this time, or badly wounded at the 
best.” 


140 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“What do you say?” asked Mr. Haredale. 

“ I say,” said Joe, “ first, that it was a bold thing to 
bo in the crowd at all disguised as one of them ; though 
I won’t say much about that, on second thoughts, for 
that’s my case too. Secondly, that it was a brave and * 
glorious action — that’s what I call it — to strike that 
fellow off his horse before their eyes ! ” 

“ What fellow ! Whose eyes ! ” - 

“ What fellow, sir ! ” cried Joe : “ a fellow who has . 
no good-will to you, and who has the daring and dev- 
iltry in him of twenty fellows. I know him of old. 
Once in the house, he would have found you, here or ‘ 
anywhere. The rest owe you no particular grudge, 
and, unless they see you, will only think of drinking 
themselves dead. But we lose time. Are you ready 
*“ Quite,” said Edward. “ Put out the torch, Joe, and 
go on. ' And be silent, there’s a good fellow.” 

“ Silent or not silent,” murmured Joe, as he dropped 
the flaring link upon the ground, crushed it with his 
foot, and gave his hand to Mr. Haredale, “ it was a 
brave and glorious action; — no man can alter that.” 

Both Mr. Haredale and the worthy vintner were too 
amazed and too much hurried to ask any further ques- 
tions, so followed their conductors in silence. It seemed, 
from a short whispering which presently ensued between 
them and the vintner relative to the best way of escape, 
that they had entered by the back-door, with the con-' 
nivance of John Grueby, who watched outside with the 
key in his pocket, and whom they had taken into their 
confidence. A part of the crowd coming up that way,, 
just as they entered, John had double-locked the door 
again, and made off for the soldiers, so that means of 
retreat was cut from under them. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


141 


However, as the front-door had been forced, and this 
minor crowd being anxious to get at the liquor, had no 
fancy for losing time in breaking down another, but had 
gone round and got in from Holbom with the rest, the 
narrow lane in the rear was quite free of people. So, 
when they had crawled through the passage indicated by 
the vintner (which was a mere shelving-trap for the ad- 
mission of casks), and had managed with some difficulty 
to unchain and raise the door at the upper end, they 
emerged into the street without being observed or inter- 
rupted. Joe still holding Mr. Haredale tight, and Ed- 
ward taking the same care of the vintner, they hurried 
through the streets at a rapid pace ; occasionally stand- 
ing aside to let some fugitives go by, or to keep out of 
the way of the soldiers who followed them, and whose 
questions, when they halted to put any, were speedily 
stopped by one whispered word from Joe. 



142 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


CHAPTER LXVIIL 

N While Newgate was burning on the previous night, 
Barnaby and his father, having been passed among th« 
crowd from hand to hand, stood in Smithfield, on the 
outskirts of the mob, gazing at the flames like men who 
had been suddenly aroused from sleep. Some moments 
elapsed before they could distinctly remember where 
they were, or how they got there ; or recollected that 
while they were standing idle and listless spectators of 
the fire, they had tools in their hands which had been 
hurriedly given them that they might free themselves 
from their fetters. 

Barnaby, heavily ironed as he was, if he had obeyed 
his first impulse, or if he had been alone, would have 
made his way back to the side of Hugh, who to his 
clouded intellect now shone forth with the new lustre of 
being his preserver and truest friend. But his father’s 
terror of remaining in the streets, communicated itself to 
him when he comprehended the full extent of his fears, 
and impressed him with the same eagerness to fly to a 
place of safety. 

In a corner of the market among the pens for cattle, 
Barnaby knelt down, and pausing every now and then 
to pass his hand over his father’s face, or look up to him 
with a smile, knocked off his irons. When he had seen 
aim spring, a free man, to his feet, and had given vent 
to the transport of delight which the sight awakened, he 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


143 


went to work upon his own, which soon fell rattling down 
upon the ground, and left his limbs unfettered. 

Gliding away together when this task was accom- 
plished, and passing several groups of men, each gath- 
ered round a stooping figure to hide him from those who 
passed, but unable to repress the clanking sound of ham- 
mers, which told that they were too busy at the same 
work, — the two fugitives made towards Clerkenwell, 
and passing thence to Islington, as the nearest point of 
egress, were quickly in the fields. After wandering 
about for a long time, they found in a pasture near 
Finchley a poor shed, with walls of mud, and roof of 
grass and brambles, built for some cowherd, but now 
deserted. Here, they lay down for the rest of the night 

They wandered to and fro when it was day, and once 
Barnaby went off alone to a cluster of little cottages two 
or three miles away, to purchase some bread and milk. 
But finding no better shelter, they returned to the same 
place, and lay down again to wait for night. 

Heaven alone can tell with what vague thoughts of 
duty and affection ; with what strange promptings of 
nature, intelligible to him as to a man of radiant mind 
and most enlarged capacity ; with what dim memories 
of children he had played with when a child himself, 
who had prattled of their fathers, and of loving them, 
and being loved ; with how many half-remembered, 
dreamy associations of his mother’s grief and tears and 
widowhood ; he watched and tended this man. But that 
a vague and shadowy crowd of such ideas came slowly 
on him ; that they taught him to be sorry when he 
looked upon his haggard face, that they overflowed his 
eyes when he stooped to kiss him, that they kept him 
waking in a tearful gladness, shading him from the sun, 


144 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


fanning him with leaves, soothing him when he started 
in his sleep — ah ! what a troubled sleep it was — and 
wondering when she would come to join them and be 
happy, is the truth. He sat beside him all that day 
listening for her footsteps in every breath of air, looking 
for her shadow on the gently, waving grass, twining the 
hedge flowers for her pleasure when she came, and his 
when he awoke ; and stooping down from time to time 
to listen to his mutterings, and wonder why he was so 
restless in that quiet place. The sun went down, and 
night came on, and he was still quite tranquil ; busied 
with these thoughts, as if there were no other people in 
the world, and the dull cloud of smoke hanging on the 
immense city in the distance, hid no vices, no crimes, 
no life or death, or causes of disquiet — nothing but 
clear air. 

But the hour had now come when he must go alone 
to find out the blind man, (a task that filled him with 
delight,) and bring him to that place ; taking especial 
care that he was not w^atched or followed on his way 
back. He listened to the directions he must observe, 
repeated them again and again, and after twice or thrice 
returning to surprise his father with a light-hearted 
laugh, went forth, at last upon his errand : leaving 
Grip, whom he had carried from the jail in his arms, 
to his care. 

Fleet of foot, and anxious to return, he sped swiftly 
on towards the city, but could not reach it before the 
fires began, and mads the night angry with their dismal 
•ustrc. When he entered the town — it might be that 
he was changed by going there without his late com- 
Danions, and on no violent errand ; or by the beautiful 
solitude in which he had passed the day, or by the 


BARNABT RUDGE. 


145 


thoughts that had come upon him, — but it seemed 
peopled by a legion of devils. This flight and pursuit, 
this cruel burning and destroying, these dreadful cries 
and stunning noises, were they the good lord’s noble 
cause ! 

Tliough almost stupefied by the bewildering scene, 
still he found the blind man’s house. It was shut up 
and tenantless. He waited for a long while, but no one 
came. At last he withdrew ; and as he knew by this 
lime that the soldiers were firing, and many people must 
have been killed, he went down into Holborn, where he 
heard the great crowd was, to try if he could find Hugh, 
and persuade him to avoid the danger, and return with 
him. 

If he had been stunned and shocked before, his horror 
was increased a thousand-fold when he got into this vor- 
tex of the riot, and not being an actor in the terrible 
spectacle, had it all before his eyes. But there, in the 
midst, towering above them all, close before the house 
they were attacking now, was Hugh on horseback, call- 
ing to the rest ! 

Sickened by the sights surrounding him on every side, 
and by the heat and roar, and crash, he forced his way 
among the crowd (where many recognized him, and with 
shouts pressed back to let him pass), and in time was 
nearly up with Hugh, who was savagely threatening 
some one, but whom, or what he said, he could not, in 
the great confusion, understand. At that moment the 
crowd forced their way into the house, and Hugh — it 
was impossible to see by what means, in such a con- 
course — fell headlong down. 

Barnaby was beside him when he staggered to hia 
feet. It was well he made him hear his voice, or 


VI. -I HI. 


BMINABY EUDGE. 


I'le 

Hugh, M ith his uplifted axe, would have cleft his skull 
In twain. 

“ Barnaby — you ! Whose hand was that, that struck 
me down ? ” 

“ Not mine.” 

“ Whose ! — I say, whose I ” he cried, reeling back, 
and looking wildly round. “ What are we doing ? 
Where is he ? Show me ! ” 

“You are hurt,” said Barnaby — as indeed he was, 
in the head, both by the blow he had received, and 
by his horse’s hoof. “ Come away with me.” 

As he spoke, he took the horse’s bridle in his hand, 
turned him, and dragged Hugh several paces. This 
brought them out of the crowd, .which was pouring from 
the street into the vintner’s cellars. 

“ Where’s — where’s Dennis ? ” said Hugh, coming 
to a stop and checking Barnaby with his strong arm. 
“ Where has he been all day ? What did he mean by 
leaving me as he did, in the jail, last night ? Tell me, 
you — d’ ye hear ! ” 

With a flourish of his dangerous weapon, he fell down 
upon the ground Kke a log. After a minute, though 
already frantic with drinking and with the wound in his 
head, he crawled to a stream of burning spirit which was 
pouring down the kennel, and began to drink at it as if 
it were a brook of water. 

Barnaby drew him away and forced him to nse. 
Though he could neither stand nor walk, he involun- 
tarily staggered to his horse, climbed upon his back, 
and clung there. After vainly attempting to divest 
the animal of his clanking trappings, Barnaby sprung 
up behind him, snatched the bridle, turned into Leather 
Lane, which was close at hand, and urged the frightened 
horse into a heavy trot. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


147 


He looked back, once, before he left the street; and 
looked upon a sight not easily to be erased, even from 
his remembrance, so long as he had life. 

The vintner’s house with half a dozen others near at 
hand, was one great, glowing blaze. All night, no one 
had essayed to quench the flames or stop their progress : 
but now a body of soldiers were actively engaged in 
pulling down two old wooden houses, which were every 
moment in danger of taking fire, and which could scarce- 
ly fail, if they were left to burn, to extend the confiagra- 
tion immensely. The tumbling down of nodding walls 
and heavy blocks of wood, the hooting and the execra- 
tions of the crowd, the distant firing of other military 
detachments, the distracted looks and cries of those 
whose habitations were in danger, the hurrying to and 
fro of frightened people with their goods ; the refiectionau 
in every quarter of the sky, of deep, red, soaring flames, 
as though the last day had come and the whole universe 
were burning; the dust, and smoke, and drift of fiery 
particles, scorching and kindling all it fell upon ; the hot 
unwholesome vapor, the blight on everything ; the stars, 
and moon, and very sky obliterated ; -i— made up such a 
sum of dreariness and ruin, that it seemed as if the face 
of Heaven were blotted out, and night, in its rest and 
quiet, and softened light, never could look upon the 
earth again. 

But there was a worse spectacle than this — worse by 
far than fire and smoke, or even the rabble’s unappeas- 
able and maniac rage. The gutters of the street, and 
every crack and fissure in the stones, ran with scorching 
spirit, which, being dammed up hy busy hands, over- 
flowed the road and pavement, and formed a great pool 
in which the people dropped down dead by dozens. 


148 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


' They lay in heaps all round this fearful pond, husbands 
and wives, fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, 
women with children in their arms and babies at their 
breasts, and drank until they died. While some stooped 
with their lips to the brink and never raised their heads 
again, others sprang up from their fiery draught, and 
danced, half in a mad triumph, and half in the agony of 
suffocation, until they fell, and steeped their corpses in 
the liquor that had killed them. Nor was even this the 
worst or most-appalling kind of death that happened on 
this fatal night. From the burning cellars, where they 
drank out of hats, pails, buckets, tubs, and shoes, some 
men were drawn, alive, but all alight from head to foot ; 
who, in their unendurable anguish and suffering, making 
for anything that had the look of water, rolled, hissing, 
.in this hideous lake, and splashed up liquid fire which 
lapped in all it met with as it ran along the surface, and 
neither spared the living nor the dead. On this last 
night of the great riots — for the last nigh^ it was — the 
wretched victims of a senseless outcry, became them- 
selves the dust and ashes of the flames they had kindled, 
and strewed the public streets of London. 

With all he saw in this last glance fixed indelibly upon 
his mind, Barnaby hurried from the city which enclosed 
such horrors ; and holding down his head that he might 
not even see the glare of the fires upon the quiet land- 
scape, was soon in the still country roads. 

He stopped at about half a mile from the shed where 
his father lay, and with some difiaculty making Hugh 
sensible that he must dismount, sunk the horse’s furni- 
ture in a pool of stagnant water, and turned the animal 
loose. That done, he supported his companion as well 
as he could, and led him slowly forward. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


119 


CHAPTER LXIX. 

It was the dead of night, and very dark, when Bar- 
naby, with his stumbling comrade, approached the place 
where he had left his father ; but he could see him steal- 
ing away into the gloom, distrustful even of him, and 
rapidly retreating. After calling to him twice or thrice 
that there was nothing to fear, but without effect, he suf- 
fered Hugh to sink upon the ground, and followed to* 
bring him back. 

He continued to creep away, until Barnaby was close 
upon him ; then turned, and said in a terrible, though 
suppressed voice : 

“ Let me go. Do not lay hands upon me. You have 
told her ; and you and she together have betrayed me ! ” 

Barnaby looked at him, in silence. 

“ You have seen your mother ! ” 

“ No,” cried Barnaby, eagerly. Not for a long time 
■ — longer than I can tell. A whole year, I think. Is ’ 
she here ? ” 

His father looked upon him steadfastly for a few mo- 
ments, and then said — drawing nearer to him as he 
spoke, for, seeing his face, and hearing his words, it was 
inpossible to doubt his truth : — 

“ What man is that ? ” 

“ Hugh — Hugh. Only Hugh. You know him. He 
will not harm you. Why, you’re afraid of Hugh ! Ha, 
ha, ha ! Afraid of gruff, old, noisy Hugh ! ” 


150 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


*' What man is he, I ask you ? ” he rejoined so fiercely, 
that Barnaby stopped in his laugh, and shrinking back, 
surveyed him with a look of terrified amazement. 

“ Why, how stern you are ! You make me fear you 
though you are my father. Why do you speak to me 
60 ? ” 

— “I want,” he answered, putting away the hand 
which his son with a timid desire to propitiate him laid 
upon his sleeve, — “I want an answer, and you give me 
only jeers and questions. Who have you brought with 
you to this hiding-place, poor fool; and where is the 
blind man ? ” 

“ I don’t know where. His house was close shut. I 
waited, but no person came ; that was no fault of mine 
This is Hugh — brave Hugh, who broke into that ugly 
jail, and set us free. Aha I You like him now, do you ? 
You like him now ! ” 

“ Why does he lie upon the ground ? ” 

“ He has had a fall, and has been drinking. The 
fields and trees go round, and round, and round with 
him, and the ground heaves under his feet. You know 
him ? You remember ? See ! ” 

They had by this time returned to where he lay, and 
both stooped over him to look into his face. 

“ I recollect the man,” his father murmured. “ Why 
did you bring him here ? ” 

“ Because he would have been killed if I had left him 
over yonder. They were firing guns and shedding blood. 
Does the sight of blood turn you sick, father ? I see it 
does by your face. That’s like me — What are you 
looking at ? ” 

“ At nothing ! ” said the murderer softly, as he 
started back a pace or two, and gazed with sunken 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


151 


jaw and staring eyes above his son’s head. “ At noth- 
ing ! ” 

He remained in the same attitude and with the same 
expression on his face for a minute or more ; then 
glanced slowly round as if he had lost something ; and 
went shivering back, towards the shed. 

“ Shall I bring him in, father ? ” asked Barnaby, who 
had looked on wondering. 

He only answered with a suppressed groan, and lying 
down upon the ground, wrapped his cloak about his head, 
and shrunk into the darkest corner. 

Finding that nothing would rouse Hugh now, or make 
him sensible for a moment, Barnaby dragged him along 
the grass, and laid him on a little heap of refuse hay and 
straw which had been his own bed ; first having brought 
some water from a running stream hard by, and washed 
his wound, and laved his hands and face. Then he lay 
down himself, between the two, to pass the night ; and 
looking at the stars, fell fast asleep. 

Awakened early in the morning, by the sunshine and 
the songs of birds, and hum of insects, he left them sleep- 
ing in the hut, and walked into the sweet and pleasant 
air. But he felt that on his jaded senses, oppressed and 
burdened with the dreadful scenes of last night, and 
many nights before, all the beauties of opening day, 
which he had so often tasted, and in which he had had 
such deep delight, fell heavily. He thought of the blithe 
mornings when he and the dogs went bounding on to- 
gether through the woods and fields ; and the recollec- 
tion filled his eyes with tears. He had no consciousness, 
God help him, of having done wrong, nor had he any 
new perception of the merits of the cause in which he 
had been engaged, or those of the men who advocated 


152 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


it ; but he was flill of cares now, and regrets, and dismal 
recollections, and wishes (quite unknown to him before) 
that this or that event had never happened, and that the 
sorrow and suffering of so many people had been spared. 
And now he began to think how happy they would be 
— his father, mother, he, and Hugh — if they rambled 
away together, and lived in some lonely place, where 
there were none of these troubles ; and that perhaps the 
blind man, who nad talked so wisely about gold, and told 
him of the great secrets he knew, could teach them how- 
to live without being pinched by want. As this occurred 
to him, he was the more sorry that he had not seen him 
last night ; and he was still brooding over this regret, 
when his father came, and touched him on the shoulder. 

“ Ah ! ” cried Barnaby, starting from his fit of thought- 
fulness. “ Is it only you ? ” 

“ Who should it be ? ” 

“ I almost thought,” he answered, “ it was the blind 
man. I must have some talk with him, father.” 

' “ And so must I, for without seeing him., I don’t know 
where to fly or what to do, and lingering here is death 
You must go to him again, and bring him here.” 
r “ Must I ! ” cried Barnaby, delighted ; “ that’s brave . 
father. That’s what I want to do.” 

“ But you must bring only him, and none other. Ana 
though you wait at his door a whole day and night, still 
you must wait, and not come back without him.” 

“ Don’t you fear that,” he cried gayly. “ He shall 
come, he shall come.” 

“ Trim off these gewgaws,” said his father, plucking 
the scraps of ribbon and the feathers from his hat, “ and 
over your own dress wear my cloak. Take heed how < 
you go, and they will be too busy in the streets to notice ' 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


153 


you. Of your coming back you need take no account, 
for he’ll manage that, safely.” 

“ To be sure ! ” said Barnaby. “ To be sure he will ! 
A wise man, father, and one who can teach us to be 
rich ! Oh ! I know him, I know him ! ” 

He was speedily dressed, and as well disguised as he 
could be. With a lighter heart he then set off upon his 
second journey, leaving Hugh, who was still in a drunken 
stupor, stretched upon the ground within the shed, and 
his father walking to and fro before it. < 

The murderer, full of anxious thought?, looked after 
him, and paced up and down, disquieted by every breath 
of air that whispered among the boughs, and by every 
light shadow thrown by the passing clouds upon the 
daisied ground. He was anxious for his safe return, 
and yet, though his own life and safety hung upon it, felt 
a relief while he was gone. In the intense selfishness 
which the constant presence before him of his great 
crimes, and their consequences here and hereafter, en- 
gendered, every thought of Barnaby, as his son, was 
swallowed up and lost. Still, his presence was a torture 
and reproach ; in his wild eyes there were terrible 
images of that guilty night; with his unearthly aspect, 
and his half-formed mind, he seemed to the murderer a 
creature who had sprung into existence from his victim’s 
blood. He could not bear his look, his voice, his touch ; 
and yet he was forced, by his own desperate condition 
and his only hope of cheating the gibbet, to have him by 
hin side, and to know that he was inseparable from his 
single chance of escape. 

He walked to and fro, with little rest, all day, revolv- 
' ing these things in his mind ; and still Hugh lay, uncon- 
' scious, in the shed. At length, when the sun was setting, 


154 


BARNABY RUDGE. • 


Barnaby returned, leading the blind man, and talking 
earnestly to him as they came along together. 

The murderer advanced to meet them, and bidding 
his son go on and speak to Hugh, who had just then 
staggered to his feet, took his place at the blind man’s 
elbow, and slowly followed, towards the shed. 

“ Why did you send him ? ” said Stagg. “ Don’t you 
know it was the way to have him lost, as soon as 
found ? ” 

“Would you have had me come myself?” returned 
the other. 

“ Humph ! Perhaps not. I was before the jail on 
Tuesday night, but missed you in the crowd. I was out 
last night, too. There was good work last night — gay 
work — profitable work ” — he added, rattling the money 
in his pockets. 

“ Have you ” — 

— “ Seen your good lady ? Yes.” 

“ Do you mean to tell me more, or not ? ” 

“ I’ll tell you all,” returned the blind man, with a 
laugh. “ Excuse me — but I love to see you so impa- 
tient. There’s energy in it.” 

“ Does she consent to say the word that may save 
me?” 

“No,” returned the blind man emphatically, as he 
turned his face towards him. “ No. Thus it is. She 
has been at death’s door since she lost her darling — has 
been insensible, and I know not what. I tracked her to 
a hospital, and presented myself (with your leave) at her 
bedside. Our talk was not a long one, for she was weak, 
and there being people near, I was not quite easy. Bu*" 
I told her all that you and I agreed upon, and pointed 
out the young gentleman’s position in strong terms. She 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


155 


tried to soften me, but that, of course (as I told her), 
was lost time. She cried and moaned, you may be sure ; 
all women do. Then, of a sudden, she found her voice and 
strength, and said that Heaven would help her and her 
innocent son ; and that to Heaven she appealed against 
us — which she did ; in really very pretty language, I 
assure you. I advised her, as a friend, not to count too 
much on assistance from any such distant quarter — 
recommended her to think of it — told her where I lived 
— said I knew she would send to me before noon, next 
day — and left her, either in a faint or shamming.” 

When he had concluded this narration, during which 
he had made several pauses, for the convenience of 
cracking and eating nuts, of which he seemed to have a 
pocketful, the blind man pulled a flask from his pocket, 
took a draught himself, and offered it to his companion. 

“ You wofft, won’t you ? ” he said, feeling that he 
pushed it from him. “ Well 1 Then the gallant gentle- 
man who’s lodging with you, will. Hallo, bully ! ” 

“ Death ! ” said the other, holding him back. “ Will 
you tell me what I am to do ! ” 

“ Do ! Nothing easier. Make a moonlight flitting in 
two hours* time with the young gentleman (he’s quite 
ready to go ; I have been giving him good advice as we 
came along), and get as far from London as you can. 
Let me know where you are, and leave the rest to me. 
She mmt come round ; she can’t hold out long ; and as 
to the chances of your being retaken in the mean while, 
why it wasn’t one man who got out of Newgate, but 
three hundred. Think of that, for your comfort.” 

“ We must support life. How ? ” 

“ How ! ” repeated the blind man. “ By eating and 
di’inking. And how get meat and drink, but by paying 


15G 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


for it ! Money ! ” he cried, slapping his pocket. “ Is 
money the word ? Why the streets have been running 
money. Devil send that the sport’s not over yet, for 
these are jolly times ; golden, rare, roaring, scrambling 
times. Hallo, bully ! Hallo ! Hallo ! Drink, bully, 
drink. Where are ye there ! Hallo ! ” 

With such vociferations, and with a boisterous man- 
ner which bespoke his perfect abandonment to the gen- 
eral license and disorder, he groped his way towards 
the shed, where Hugh and Barnaby were sitting on the 
ground. 

“ Put it about ! ” he cried, handing his flask to Hugh. 
“ The kennels run with wine and gold. Guineas and 
strong water flow from the very pumps. About with it, 
don’t spare it I ” 

Exhausted, unwashed, unshorn, begrimed with smoke 
and dust, his hair clotted with blood, his voice quite 
gone, so that he spoke in whispers ; his skin parched up 
by fever, his whole body bruised and cut, and beaten 
about, Hugh still took the flask, and raised it to his lips. 
He was in the act of drinking, when the front of the 
shed was suddenly darkened, and Dennis stood before 
them. 

“ No offence, no offence,” said that personage in a 
conciliatory tone, as Hugh stopped in his draught, and 
eyed him, with no pleasant look, from head to foot. 

No offence, brother. Barnaby here too, eh ? How 
are you, Barnaby ? And two other gentlemen ! Your 
humble servant, gentlemen. No offence to you either, I 
hope. Eh, brothers ? ” 

Notwithstanding that he spoke in this very friendly 
And confident manner, he seemed to have considerable 
hesitation about entering, and remained outside the roof. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


157 


He was rather better dressed than usual : wearing the 
same suit of threadbare black, it is truC) but having 
round his neck an unwholesome-looking cravat of a yel- 
lowish white ; and, on his hands, great leather gloves, 
such as a gardener might wear in following his trade. 
His shoes were newly greased, and ornamented with a 
pair of rusty iron buckles ; the pack-thread at his knees* 
had been renewed ; and where he wanted buttons, he 
wore pins. Altogether, he had something the look of 
a tipstaff, or a bailiff’s follower, desperately faded, but 
who had a notion of keeping up the appearance of a 
professional character, and making the best of the worst 
means. 

“ You’re very snug here,” said Mr. Dennis, pulling 
out a mouldy pocket-handkerchief, which looked like a 
decomposed halter, and wiping his forehead in a nervous ' 
manner. 

“ Not snug enough to prevent your finding us, it 
seems,” Hugh answered sulkily. 

“ Why, I’ll tell you what, brother,” said Dennis, with 
a friendly smile, when you don’t want me to know 
which way you’re riding, you must wear another sort 
of bells on your horse. Ah ! I know the sound of 
them you wore last night, and have got quick ears for 
’em; that’s the truth. Well, but how are you, brother?” 

He had by this time approached, and now ventured to 
lit down by him. 

“ IIow am I?” answered Hugh. “Where were you 
yesterday ? Where did you go when you left me in 
the jail ? Why did you leave me ? And what did you 
jnean by rolling y^our eyes and shaking your fist at me, 
eh ? ” 

“ I shake my fist ! — at you, brother ! ” said Dennis, 


1,58 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


gently checking Hugh’s uplifted hand, which looked 
threatening. 

“ Your stick, then ; it’s all one.” 

“ Lord love you, brother, I meant nothing. You 
don’t understand me by half. I shouldn’t wonder now,” 
he added, in the tone of a desponding and injured man, 
“ but you thought, because I wanted them chaps left in 
the prison, that I was a-going to desert the banners ? ” 

Hugh told him, with an oath, that he had thought 

80 . 

“ Well ! ” said Mr. Dennis, mournfully, “ if you a’n’t 
enough to make a man mistrust his feller-creeturs, I 
don’t know what is. Desert the banners! Mel Ned 
Dennis, as was so christened ' by his own father! — Is 
this axe your’n brother ? ” 

“ Yes, it’s mine,” said Hugh, in the same sullen man- 
ner as before ; “ it might have hurt you, if you had 
come in its way once or twice last night. Put it down.” 

“ Might have hurt me ! ” said Mr. Dennis, still keep- 
ing it in his hand, and feeling the edge with an air of 
abstraction. “ Might have hurt me ! and me exerting 
myself all the time to the wery best advantage. Here’s 
a world ! And you’re not a-going to ask me to take a 
sup out of that ’ere bottle, eh ? ” 

Hugh passed it towards him. As he raised it to his 
lips, Barnaby jumped up, and motioning them to be si- 
lent, looked eagerly out. 

“What’s the matter, Barnaby?” said Dennis, glancing 
at Hugh and dropping the flask, but still holding the axe 
in his hand. 

“ Hush ! ” he answered softly. “ What do I see glit- 
tering behind the hedge ? ” 

“ What ! ” cried the hangman, raising his voice to its 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


159 


highest pitch, and laying hold of him and Hii*gh. “Not 
— not SOLDIERS, surely!” 

That moment, the shed was filled with armed men ; 
and a body of horse, galloping into the field, drew up 
before it. 

“ There 1 ” said Dennis, who remained untouched 
among them when they had seized their prisoners ; “ it's 
them two young ones, gentlemen, that the proclamation 
puts a price on. This other’s an escaped felon — Tm 
sorry for it, brother,” he added, in a tone of resignation, 
addressing himself to Hugh ; “ but you’ve brought it on 
yourself ; you forced me to do it ; you wouldn’t respect 
the soundest constitootional principles, you know ; you 
went and wiolated the wery framework of society. I 
had sooner have given away a trifle in charity than done 
this, I would upon my soul. — If you’ll keep fast hold 
on ’em, gentlemen, I think I can make a shift to tie ’em 
better than you can.” 

But this operation was postponed for a few moments 
by a new occurrence. Tlie blind man, whose ears were 
quicker than most people’s sight, had been alarmed, be- 
fore Barnaby, by a rustling in the bushes, under cover 
of which the soldiers had advanced. He retreated in- 
stantly — had hidden somewhere for a minute — and 
probably in his confusion mistaking the point at which 
he had emerged, was now seen running across the open 
meadow. 

An officer cried directly that he had helped to plun- 
der a house last night. He was loudly called on to 
surrender. He ran the harder, and in a few seconds 
would have been out of gun-shot. The word was given, 
Rnd the men fired. 

There was a breathless pause and a profound silence, 


160 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


during whrdi all eyes were fixed upon him. He had 
been seen to start at the discharge, as if the report had 
frightened him. But he neither stopped nor slackened 
his pace in the least, and ran on full forty yards farther. 
Then, without one reel or stagger, or sign of faintness 
or quivering of any limb, he dropped. 

Some of them hurried up to where he lay ; — the 
hangman with them. Everything had passed so quick- 
ly, that the smoke was not yet scattered, but curled 
slowly off in a little cloud, which seemed like the dead 
man’s spirit moving solemnly away. There were a few 
drops of blood upon the grass — more, when they turned 
him over — that was all. 

“ Look here ! Look here ! ” said the hangman, stoop- 
ing one knee beside the body, and gazing up with a 
disconsolate face at the officer and men. Here’s a 
pretty sight ! ” 

“ Stand out of the way,” replied the officer. “ Ser- 
geant ! see what he had about him.” 

The man turned his pockets out upon the grass, and 
counted, besides some foreign coins and two rings, five- 
and-forty guineas in gold. These were bundled up in 
a handkerchief and carried away ; the body remained 
there for the present, but six men and the sergeant were 
left to take it to the nearest public-house. 

“ Now then, if you’re going,” said the sergeant, clap- 
ping Dennis on the back, and pointing after the officer 
who was walking towards the shed. 

To which Mr. Dennis only replied, “ Don’t talk to 
me ! ” and then repeated what he had said before, name- 
’y, “ Here’s a pretty sight ! ” 

“It’s not one that you care for much, 1 should think,” 
observed the sergeant coolly. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


161 


u "Wliy, who,” said Mr. Dennis, rising, “ should care 
' for it, if I don’t ? ” 

“ Oh ! I didn’t know you was so tender-hearted,” said 
the sergeant. “ That’s all ! ” 

“Tender-hearted ! ” echoed Dennis. “ Tender-hearted ! 
Look at this man. Do you call this constitootional ? Do 
you see him shot through and through instead of being 
worked off like a Briton ? Damme, if I know -which 
party to side with. You’re as bad as the other. What's 
to become of the country if the military power’s to go 
a-superseding the ciwilians in this way ? Where's this 
poor fellow-creetur’s rights as a citizen, that he didn't 
have me in his lask moments ! I was here. I was will- 
ing. I was ready. These are nice times, brother, to 
have the dead crying out against us in this way, and 
sleep comfortably in our beds arterwards ; wery nice ! ” 
Whether he derived any material consolation from 
binding the prisoners, is uncertain ; most probably he 
did. At all events, his being summoned to that work, 
diverted him, for the time, from these painful reflections, 
and gave his thoughts a more congenial occupation. 

They were not all three carried off together, but in 
two parties ; Barnaby and his father, going by one road 
in the centre of a body of foot ; and Hugh, fast bound 
upon a horse, and strongly guarded by a troop of cavalry, 
being taken by another. 

They had no opportunity for the least communication, 
in the short interval which preceded their departure; 
being kept strictly apart. Hugh only observed that 
Barnaby walked with a drooping head among his guard, 
and, without raising his eyes, that he tried to wave his 
fettered hand when he passed. For himself, he buoyed 
up his courage as he rode along, with the assurance that 

VOL. III. 11 


162 


13ARNABY RUDGE. 


the mob would force his jail wherever it might be, and 
set him at liberty. But when they got into London, and 
more especially into Fleet Market, lately the stronghold 


of the rioters. 

where the military were rooting out the 

last remnant of the crowd, 

he saw 

that this hope was 

gone, 

and felt 

that 

he was 

riding to his death. 




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BARNABY BUDGE. 


163 


CHAPTER LXX. 

Mb. Dennis having despatched this piece of business 
without any personal hurt or inconvenience, and having 
now retired into the tranquil respectability of private 
life, resolved to solace himself with half an hour or so 
of female society. With this amiable purpose in his 
mind, he bent his steps towards the house where Dolly 
and Miss Haredale were still confined, and whither Miss 
Miggs had also been removed by order of Mr. Simon 
Tappertit. 

As he walked along the streets with his leather gloves 
clasped behind him, and his face indicative of cheerful 
thought and pleasant calculation, Mr. Dennis might have 
been likened unto a farmer ruminating among his crops, 
and enjoying by anticipation the bountiful gifts of Provi- 
dence. Look where he would, some heap of ruins 
afforded him rich promise of a working off; the whole 
town appeared to have been ploughed, and sown, and 
nurtured by most genial weather ; and a goodly harvest 
was at hand. 

Having taken up arms and resorted to deeds of vio- 
lence, with the great main object of preserving the Old 
Bailey in all its purity, and the gallows in all its pristine 
usefuli\ess and moral grandeur, it would perhaps be going 
too far to assert that Mr. Dennis had ever distinctly con- 
templated and foreseen this happy state of things. He 
rather looked upon it as one of those beautiful dispensa- 


161 


BARNABY RUDGF..- 


tions which are inscrutably brought about for the behoof 
and advantage of good men. He felt, as it were, per- 
sonally referred to, in this prosperous ripening for the 
gibbet ; and had never considered himself so much the 
pet and favorite child of Destiny, or loved that lady so 
well or with such a calm and virtuous reliance, in all 
his life. 

As to being taken up, himself, for a rioter, and pun* 
islied with the rest, Mr. Dennis dismissed that possibility 
from his thoughts as an idle chimera ; arguing that the 
line of conduct he had adopted at Newgate, and the ser- 
vice he had rendered that day, would be more than a 
set-off against any evidence which might identify him 
as a member of the crowd. That any charge of com- 
panionship which might be made against him by those 
who were themselves in danger, would certainly go for 
nought. And that if any trivial indiscretion on his part 
should unluckily come out, the uncommon usefulness of 
his office, at present, and the great demand for the exer- 
cise of its functions, would certainly cause it to be winked 
at, and passed over. Jn a word, he had played his cards 
throughout, with great care ; had changed sides at the 
very nick of time; had delivered up two of the most 
notorious rioters, and a distinguished felon to boot ; and 
was quite at his ease. 

Saving — for there is a reservation ; and even Mr. 
Dennis was not perfectly happy — saving for one cir- 
cumstance ; to wit, the forcible detention of Dolly and 
Miss Haredale, in a house almost adjoining his own. 
This was a stumbling-block ; for if they were discovered 
and released, they could, by the testimony they had it in 
their power to give, place him in a situation of great 
jeopardy; and to set them at liberty, first extorting from 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


165 


them ail oath of secrecy and silence, was a thing not 
to be thought of. It was more, perhaps, with an eye 
to the danger which lurked in this quarter, than from 
his abstract love of conversation with the sex, that the 
hangman, quickening his steps, now hastened into their 
society, cursing the amorous natures of Hugh and Mr. 
Tappertit with great heartiness, at every step he took. 

When he entered the miserable room in which they 
were confined, Dolly and Miss Haredale withdrew in 
silence to the remotest corner. But Miss Miggs, who 
was particularly tender of her reputation, immediately 
fell upon her knees and began to scream very loud, cry- 
ing, “ What will become of me ! ” — Where is my 
Simmuns ! ” — “ Have mercy, good gentleman, on my 
sex’s weaknesses ! ” — with other doleful lamentations 
of that nature, which she delivered with great pro- 
priety and decorum. 

• “ Miss, miss,” whispered Dennis, beckoning to her 

with his forefinger, “ come here — I won’t hurt you. 
Come here, my lamb, will you ? ” 

On hearing this tender epithet. Miss Miggs who had 
left olF screaming when he opened his lips, and had 
listened to him attentively, began again : crying, “ Oh 
I’m his lamb ! He says I’m his lamb ! Oh gracious, 
why wasn’t I born old and ugly ! Why was I ever 
made to be the youngest of six, and all of ’em dead and 
in their blessed graves, excepting one married sister, 
which is settled in Golden Lion Court, number twenty- 
sivin, second bell-handle on the — ! ” 

“ Don’t I say I a’n’t a-going to hurt you ? ” said 
Dennis, pointing to a chair. “ Why, miss, what’s the 
matter ? ” 

“ I don’t know what mayn’t be the matter ! ” cried 


166 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Miggs, clasping her hands distractedly. “ Anything 
may be the matter ! ” 

“ But nothing is, I tell you,” said the hangman. 
“ First stop that noise, and come and sit down here, 
will you, chuckey ? ” 

The coaxing tone in which he said these latter words 
might have failed in its object, if he had not accompanied 
them with sundry sharp jerks of his thumb over one 
shoulder, and with divers winks and thru stings of his 
tongue into his cheek, from which signals the damsel 
gathered that he sought to speak to her apart, concern- 
ing Miss Haredale and Dolly. Her curiosity being 
very powerful, and her jealousy by no means inactive, 
she arose, and with a great deal of shivering and start- 
ing back, and much muscular action among all the small 
bones in her throat, gradually approached him. 

“ Sit down,” said the hangman. 

Suiting the action to the word, he thrust her rather 
suddenly and prematurely into a chair ; and designing 
to reassure her by a little harmless jocularity, such as 
is adapted to please and fascinate the sex, converted his 
right forehnger into an ideal bradawl or gimlet, and 
made as though he would screw the same into her side 
— whereat Miss Miggs shrieked again, and evinced 
symptoms of faintness. 

“ Lovey, my dear,” whispered Dennis, drawing his 
chair close to hers. “ When was your young man 
here last, eh ? ” 

“ My young man, good gentleman ! ” answered Miggs 
in a tone of exquisite distress. 

“ Ah ! Simmuns, you know — him ? ” said Dennis. 

“ Mine indeed ! ” cried Miggs, with a hurst of bitter- 
ness — and as she said it, she glanced towards Dolly. 
* Mine, good gentleman ! ” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


167 


This was just what Mr. Dennis wanted, and expected 

“ Ah ! ” he said, looking so soothingly, not to say 
amorously on Miggs, that she sat, as she afterwards 
remarked, on pins and needles of the sharpest White- 
chapel kind, not knowing what intentions might be sug- 
gesting that expression to his features ; “ I was afraid 
of that. I saw as mach, myself. It’s her fault. She 
teiU entice ’em.” 

“I wouldn’t,” cried Miggs, folding her hands and 
looking upwards with a kind of devout blankness, “I 
wouldn’t lay myself out as she does ; I wouldn’* be as 
bold as her ; I wouldn’t seem to say to all male cree- 
turs ‘ come and kiss me ’ ” — and here a shudder quite 
convulsed her frame — “for any earthly crowns as 
might be offered. Worlds,” Miggs added solemnly, 
“ should not reduce me. No. Not if I was Wenis.” 

“ Well, but you are Wenus you know,” said Mr. Den- 
nis, confidentially. 

“ No, I am not, good gentleman,” answered Miggs, 
shaking her head with an air of self-denial which seemed 
to imply that she might be if she chose, but she hoped 
she knew better. “ No I am not, good gentleman. Don’t 
charge me with it.” 

Up to this time she had turned round, every now and 
then, to where Dolly and Miss Haredale had retired, 
and uttered a scream, or groan, or laid her hand upon 
her heart and trembled excessively, with a view of keep- 
ing up appearances, and giving them to understand that 
she conversed with the visitor, under protest and on 
compulsion, and at a great personal sacrifice, for their 
common good. But at this point, Mr. Dennis looked 
so very full of meaning, and gave such a singularly 
expi’cssive twitch to his face as a request to her to come 


168 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Btill nearer to him, that she abandoned these little arts, 
and gave him her whole and undivided attention. 

“ When was Simmuns here, I say ? ” quoth Dennis, 
in her ear. 

“ Not since yesterday morning ; and then only for a 
few minutes. Not all day, the day before.” 

“ You know he meant all along to carry off that 
one ? ” said Dennis, indicating Dolly by the slightest pos- 
sible jerk of his head : — “ And to hand you over to 
somebody else.” 

Miss Miggs, who had fallen into a terrible state of 
grief when the first part of this sentence was spoken, 
recovered a little at the second, and seemed by the 
sudden check she put upon her tears, to intimate that 
possibly this arrangement might meet her views ; and 
that if might, perhaps, remain an open question. 

— ‘‘But unfort’nately,” pursued Dennis, who observed 
this : “ somebody else was fond of her too, you see ; and 
even if he wasn’t, somebody else is took for a rioter, 
and it’s all over with him.” 

Miss Miggs relapsed. 

“ Now, I want,” said Dennis, “ to clear this house, 
and to see you righted. What if I was to get her off, 
out of the way, eh ? ” 

Miss Miggs, brightening again, rejoined, with many 
breaks and pauses from excess of feeling, that tempta- 
rions had been Simmuns’s bane. That it was not his 
faults, but hers (meaning Dolly’s). That men did not 
see through these dreadful arts as women did, and there- 
fore was caged and trapped, as Simmun had been. That 
she had no personal motives to serve — far from it — ■ 
on the contrary, her intentions was good towards all 
parties. But forasmuch as she knowed that Simmun, if 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


169 


Dnited to any designing and artful minxes (she would 
name no names, for that was not her dispositions) 
to any designing and artful minxes — must be made 
miserable and unhappy for life, she did incline towards 
prewentions. Such, she added, was her free confessions. 
But as this was private feelings, and might perhaps be 
looked upon as wengeance, she begged the gentleman 
would say no more. Whatever he said, wishing to do 
her duty by all mankind, even by them as had ever 
been her bitterest enemies, she would not listen to him. 
With that she stopped her ears, and shook her head 
from side to side, to intimate to Mr. Dennis that though 
he talked until he had no breath left, she was Jis deaf 
as any adder. 

“ Lookee here, my sugar-stick,” said Mr. Dennis ; 
“ if your view’s the same as mine, and you’ll only be 
quiet and slip away at the right time, I can have the 
house clear to-morrow, and be out of this trouble. — 
Stop though ! there’s the other.” 

“ Which other, sir ? ” asked Miggs — still with her 
fingers in her ears and her head shaking obstinately. 

“ Why, the tallest one, yonder,” said Dennis, as he 
stroked his chin, and added, in an undertone to him- 
self, something about not crossing Muster Gashford. 

Miss Miggs replied (still being profoundly deaf) 
that if Miss Haredale stood in the way at all, he might 
make himself quite easy on that score ; as she had 
gathered, from what passed between Hugh and Mr. 
Tappertit wdien they were last there, that she was to 
be removed alone (not by them, but by somebody else), 
to-morrow night. 

Mr. Dennis opened his eyes very wide at this piece 
of information, wliistled once, considered once, and 


170 


BARNaBY budge. 


finally slapped his head once and nodded once, as if 
he had got the clew to this mysterious removal, and 
so dismissed it. Then he imparted his design con- 
cerning Dolly to Miss Miggs, who was taken more 
deaf than before, when he began ; and so remained, all 
through. 

The notable scheme was this. Mr. Dennis was im- 
mediately to seek out from among the rioters, some 
daring young fellow (and he had one in his eye, he 
said), who, terrified by the threats he could hold out 
to him, and alarmed by the capture of so many who 
were no better and no worse than he, would gladly 
avail himself of any help to get abroad, and out of 
harm’s way, with’ his plunder, even though his journey 
were encumbered by an unwilling companion ; indeed, 
the unwilling companion being a beautiful girl, would 
probably be an additional inducement and temptation. 
Such a person found, he proposed to bring him there 
on the ensuing night, when the tall one was taken off, 
and Miss Miggs had purposely retir<'d ; and then that 
Dolly should be gagged, muftied in a cloak, and car- 
ried in any handy conveyance down to the river’s 
side ; where there were abundant means of getting her 
smuggled snugly off in any small craft of doubtful 
character, and no questions asked. With regard to the 
expense of this removal, he would say, at a rough cal- 
culation, that two or three silver tea or coffee pots, 
with something additional for drink (such as a muffineer 
or toast-rack), would more than cover it Articles of 
plate of every kind having been buried by the rioter's 
m several lonely parts of London, and particularly, as 
he knew, in St. James’s Square, which, though easy 
of access, was little frequented after dark, and had a 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


171 


convenient piece of water in the midst, the needful / 
funds were close at hand, and could be had upon the 
shortest notice. With regard to Dolly, the gentleman 
would exercise his own discretion. He would be bound 
to do nothing but to take her away, and keep her away.* 
All other arrangements and dispositions would rest en- 
tirely with himself. 

If Miss Miggs had had her hearing, no doubt she 
would have been greatly shocked by the indelicacy of 
a young female’s going away with a stranger, by night 
(for her moral feelings, as we have said, were of the 
tenderest kind) ; but directly Mr. Dennis ceased to 
speak, she reminded him that he had only wasted 
breath. She then went on to say (still with her fingers 
in her ears) that nothing less than a severe practical 
lesson would save the locksmith’s daughter from utter* 
ruin ; and that she felt it, as it were, a moral obli- 
gation and a sacred duty to the family, to wish that 
some one would devise one for her reformation. Miss 
Miggs remarked, and very justly, as an abstract senti- 
ment which happened to occur to her at the moment, 
that she dared to say the locksmith and his wife would 
murmur, and repine, if they were ever, by forcible ab- 
duction, or otherwise, to lose their child ; but that we 
seldom knew, in this world, what was best for us : such 
being our sinful and imperfect natures, that very few 
arrived at that clear understanding. 

Having brought their conversation to this satisfactory 
end, they parted : Dennis, to pursue his design, and take 
another walk about his farm : Miss Miggs, to launch, 
when he left her, into such a burst of mental anguish 
(which she gave them to understand was occasioned by 
certain tender things he had had the presumption and 


172 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


audacity to say), that little Dolly’s heart was quite 
melted. Indeed, she said and did so much to soothe 
the outraged feelings of Miss Miggs, and looked so 
beautiful while doing so, that if that young maid had 
not had ample vent for her surpassing spite, in a knowl- 
edge of the mischief that was brewing, she must have 
Bcralched her features, on the spot 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


17a 


CHAPTER LXXI. 

All next day, Emma Haredale, Dolly, and Miggs, 
remained cooped up together in what had now been 
their prison for so many days, without seeing any per- 
son, or hearing any sound but the murmured conversa- 
tion, in an outer room, of the men who kept watch over 
them. There appeared to be more of these fellows than 
there had been hitherto ; and they could no longer hear 
the voices of women, which they had before plainly dis- 
tinguished. Some new excitement, too, seemed to pre- 
vail among them ; for there was much stealthy going in 
and out, and a constant questioning of those who were 
newly arrived. They had previously been quite reck- 
less in their behavior; often making a great uproar; 
quarrelling among themselves, fighting, dancing, and 
singing. They were now very subdued and silent, con- 
versing almost in whispers, and stealing in and out with 
a soft and stealthy tread, very different from the bois- 
terous trampling in which their arrivals and departures 
had hitherto been announced to the* trembling captives. 

Whether this change was occasioned by the presence 
among them of some person of authority in their ranks, 
or by any other cause, they were unable to decide. 
Sometimes they thought it was in part attributable to 
there being a sick man in the chamber, for last night 
there had been a shuffling of feet, as though a burden 
were brought in, and afterwards a moaning, noise. But 


174 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


they had no means of ascertaining the truth : for any 
question or entreaty on their parts only provoked a 
storm of execrations, or something worse ; and they 
were too happy to be left alone, unassailed by ttireati oi 
admiration, to risk even that comfort, by any voluntary 
rommunication with those who held them in durance. 

It was sufficiently evident, both to Emma and to the 
locksmith’s poor little daughter herself, that she, I/olly, 
was the great object of attraction ; and that so soon as 
they should have leisure to indulge in the softer passion, 
Hugh and Mr. Tappertit would certainly fall to blows 
for her sake ; in which latter case, it was not very dif- 
ficult to foresee whose prize she would become. With 
all her old horror of that man revived, and deepened 
into a degree of aversion and abhorrence which no 
language can describe ; with a thousand old recollec- 
tions and regrets, and causes of distress, anxiety, and 
fear, besetting her on all sides ; poor Dolly Varden — 
sweet, blooming, buxom Dolly — ^ began to hang her 
head, and fade, and droop, like a beautiful flower. The 
color fled from her cheeks, her courage forsook her, her 
gentle heart failed. Unmindful of all her provoking 
caprices, forgetful of all her conquests and inconstancy, 
with all her winning little vanities quite gone, she yies- 
tled all the livelong day in Emma Haredale’s bosom ; 
and, sometimes calling on her dear old gray-haired 
father, sometimes on her mother, and sometimes even 
on her old home, pined slowly away, like a poor bird in 
its cage. 

Light hearts, light hearts, that float so gayly on a 
smooth stream, that are so sparkling and buoyant in. 
Ihe sunshine — down upon fruit, bloom upon flowers, 
blush in summer air, life of the winged insect, whose 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


175 


whole existence is a day — how soon ye sink in troubled 
water ! Poor Dolly’s heart — a little, gentle, idle, fickle 
thing ; giddy, restless, fluttering ; constant to nothing bu 
bright looks, and smiles, and laughter — Dolly’s heart 
was breaking. 

Emma had known grief, and could bear it better. 
She had little comfort to impart, but she could soothe 
and tend her, and she did so ; and Dolly clung to her 
like a child to its nurse. In endeavoring to inspire her 
with some fortitude, she increased her own ; and though 
the nights were long, and the days dismal, and she felt 
the wasting influence of watching and fatigue, and had 
perhaps a more defined and clear perception of their 
destitute condition and its worst dangers, she uttered no 
complaint. Before the ruffians, in whose power they 
were, she bore herself so calmly, and with such an 
appearance, in the midst of all her terror, of a secret 
conviction that they dared not harm her, that there was 
not a man among them but held her in some degree of 
dread ; and more than one believed she had a weapon 
hidden in her dress, and was prepared to use it. 

Such was their condition when they were joined by 
Miss Miggs, who gave them to understand that she too 
had been taken prisoner, because of her charms, and 
detailed such feats of resistance she had peilbrmed (her 
virtue having given her supernatural strength), that they 
felt it quite a happiness to have her for a champion. 
Nor was this the only comfort they derived at first from 
Miggs’s presence and society: for that young lady dis- 
played such resignation and long-suffering, and so much 
meek endurance, under her trials, and breathed in all 
her chaste discourse a spirit of such holy confidence anc 
tesignation, and devout belief that all would happen fo. , 


176 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


the best, that Emma felt her courage strengthened by the 
bright example ; never doubting but that everything she 
said was true, and that she, like them, was torn from all 
she loved, and agonized by doubt and apprehension. As 
to poor Dolly, she was roused, at first, by seeing one who 
came from home ; but when she heard under what cir- 
cumstances she had left it, and into whose hands her 
father had fallen, she wept more bitterly than ever, and 
refused all comfort. 

Miss Miggs was at some trouble to reprove her for 
this state of mind, and to entreat her to take example 
by herself, who, she said, was now receiving back, with 
interest, tenfold the amount of her subscriptions to the 
red-brick dwelling-house, in the articles of peace of 
mind and a quiet conscience. And, while on serious 
topics, Miss Miggs considered it her duty to try her 
hand at the conversion of Miss Haredale ; for whose 
improvement she launched into a polemical address of 
some length, in the course whereof, she likened herself 
unto a chosen missionary, and that young lady to a can- 
nibal in darkness. Indeed she returned so often to these 
subjects, and so frequently called upon them to take a 
lesson from her, — at the same time vaunting and, as it 
were, rioting In, her huge unworthiness, and abundant 
excess of sin, — that, in the course of a short time, she 
became, in that small chamber, rather a nuisance than a 
comfort, and rendered them, if possible, even more un 
happy than they had been before. 

The night had now come ; and for the first time 
(for their jailers had been regular in bringing food 
and candles), they were left in darkness. Any change 
in their condition in such a place inspired new fears ; 
ftcd when some hours had passed, and the gloom 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


177 


was still unbroken, Emma could no longer repress her 
alarm. 

They listened attentively. There was the same mur- 
muring in the outer room, and now and then a moan 
which seemed to be wrung from a person in great pain, 
who made an effort to subdue it, but could not. Even 
these men seemed to be in darkness too ; for no light 
shone through the chinks in the door, nor were they 
moving, as their custom was, but quite still : the si- 
lence being unbroken by so much as the creaking of 
tt board. 

At first. Miss Miggs wondered greatly in her own 
mind who this sick person might be ; but arriving, on 
second thoughts, at the conclusion that he was a part of 
the schemes on foot, and an artful device soon to be 
employed with great success, she opined, for Miss Hare- 
dale’s comfort, that it must be some misguided Papist 
who had been wounded : and this happy supposition en- 
couraged her to say, under her breath, “ Ally Looyer ! ” 
several times. 

“ Is it possible,” said Emma, with some indignation, 
“ that you who have seen these men committing the out- 
rages you have told us of, and who have fallen into their 
hands, like us, can exult in their cruelties ! ” 

“ Personal considerations, Miss,” rejoined Miggs, “ sinks 
into nothing, afore a noble cause. Ally Looyer ! Ally 
Looyer ! Ally Looyer, good gentlemen ! ” 

It seemed, from the shrill pertinacity with which 
Miss Miggs repeated this form of acclamation, that 
she was calling the same through the key-hole of the 
door ; but in the profound darkness she could not be 
seen. 

“ If the time has come — Heaven knows it may come 

VOL. 111. 12 


178 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


at any moment — when they are bent on prosecuting the 
designs, whatever they may be, with which they have 
brought us here, can you still encourage, and take part 
with them ? ” demanded Emma. 

“ I thank my goodness-gracious-blessed-stars I can, 
miss,” returned Miggs, with increased energy. “ Ally 
Looyer, good gentlemen ! ” 

Even Dolly, cast down and disappointed as she was, 
revived at this, and bade Miggs hold her tongue di- 
rectly. 

Which, was you pleased to observe. Miss Varsen?” 
Bhid Miggs with a strong emphasis on the irrelative 
pronoun. 

Dolly repeated her request. 

“ Ho, gracious me ! ” cried Miggs, with hysterical de- 
rision. “ Ho, gracious me ! Yes, to be sure I will. 
Ho yes ! I am a abject slave, and a toiling, moiling, 
constant-working, always-being-found-fault-with, never- 
giving-satisfactions, nor-having-no-time-to-clean-one’s-self, 
potter’s wessel — a’n’t I, miss ! Ho yes ! My situations 
is lowly, and my capacities is limited, and my duties is 
to humble myself afore the base degenerating daughters 
of their blessed mothers as is fit to keep companies with 
holy saints but is born to persecutions from wicked re- 
lations — and to demean myself before them as is no 
better than Infidels — a’n’t it, miss ! Ho yes ! My 
only becoming occupations is to help young flaunting 
pagins to brush and comb and titiwate theirselves into 
whitening and suppulchres, and leave the young men to 
think that there a’n’t a bit of padding in it nor no pinch- 
'ng ins nor fillings out nor pomatums nor deceits nor 
earthly wanities — a’n’t it, miss ! Yes, to be sure it il 
— ho j es ! ” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


179 


Having delivered these ironical passages with a most 
wonderful volubility, and with a shrillness perfectly deaf- 
ening (especially when she jerked out the interjections), 
Miss Miggs, from mere habit, and not because weeping 
was at all appropriate to the occasion, which was one of 
triumph, concluded by bursting into a flood of tears, and 
calling in an impassioned manner on the name of Sim- 
muns. 

What Emma Haredale and Dolly would have done, or 
how long Miss Miggs, now that she had hoisted her true 
colors, would have gone on waving them before their as- 
tonished senses, it is impossible to tell. Nor is it neces- 
sary to speculate on these matters, for a startling inter- 
ruption occurred at that moment, which took their whole 
attention by storm. 

This was a violent knocking at the door of the house, 
and then its sudden bursting open ; which was immedi- 
ately succeeded by a scufile in the room without, and the 
'dash of weapons. Transported with the hope that res- 
cue had at length arrived, Emma and Dolly shrieked 
aloud for help ; nor were their shrieks unanswered ; for 
after a hurried interval, a man, bearing in one hand a 
drawn sword, and in the other a taper, rushed into the 
chamber where they were conflned. 

It was some check upon their transport to find in this 
person an entire stranger, but they appealed to him, 
nevertheless, and besought him, in impassioned language, 
to restore them to their friends. 

“ For what other purpose am I here ? ” he answered, 
dosing the door, and standing with his back against it 
“ With what object have I made my way to this place, 
through difficulty and danger, but to preserve you ? ” 

With a joy for which it was impossible to find ade* 


180 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


quate expression, they embraced each other, and thanked 
Heaven for this most timely aid. Their deliverer step- 
ped forward for a moment to put the light upon the table, 
and immediately returning to his former position against 
the door, bared his head, and looked on smilingly. 

“ You have news of my uncle, sir ? ” said Emma, turn 
ing hastily towards him. 

“ And of my father and mother ? ” added 'Dolly. 

‘‘ Yes,’^ he said. “ Good news.” 

“ They are alive and unhurt ? ” they both cried at 
once. 

Yes, and unhurt,” he rejoined. 

“ And close at hand ? ” 

“ I did not say close at hand,” he answered smoothly ; 
“ they are at no great distance. Your friends, sweet 
one,” he added, addressing Dolly, “ are within a few 
hours’ journey. You will be restored to them, I hope, 
to-night.” 

“ My uncle, sir ” — faltered Emma. 

“ Your uncle, dear Miss Haredale, happily — I say 
happily, because he has succeeded where many of our 
creed have failed, and is safe — has crossed the sea, and 
is out of Britain.” 

I thank God for it,” said Emma, faintly. 

“ You say well. You have reason to be thankful : 
greater reason than it is possible for you, who have seen 
but one night of these cruel outrages, to imagine.” 

“ Does he desire,” said Emma, “ that I should follow 
him ? ” 

“ Do you ask if he desires it ? ” cried the stranger in 
surprise. “ If he desires it ! But you do not know the 
danger of remaining in England, the difficulty of escapq|5 
or the price hundreds would pay to secure the means, 


BAKNABY RUDGE. 


181 


when you make I hat inquiry. Pardon me. I had for- 
gotten that you could not, being prisoner here.” 

“ I gather, sir,” said Emma, after a moment’s pause, 
“ from what you hint at, but fear to tell me, that I have 
witnessed but the beginning, and the least, of the vio- 
lence to which we are exposed, and that it has not yet 
slackened in its fury ? ” 

He shrugged his shoulders, shook his head, lifted up 
his hands ; and with the same smooth smile, which was 
not a pleasant one to see, cast his eyes upon the ground, 
and remained silent. 

“ You may venture, sir, to speak plain,” said Emma, 
“and to tell me the worst. We have undergone some 
preparation for it.” 

But here Dolly interposed, and entreated her not to 
hear the worst, but the best ; and besought the gentle- 
man to tell them the best, and to keep the remainder 
of his news, until they were safe among their friends 
again. 

“ It is told in three words,” he said, glancing at the 
locksmith’s daughter with a look of some displeasure. 
“ The people have risen, to a man, against us ; the 
streets are filled with soldiers, who support them and 
do their bidding. We have no protection but from 
above, and no safety but in flight ; and that is a poor 
resource; for we are watched on every hand, and de- 
tained here, both by force and fraud. Miss Haredale, 
I cannot bear — believe me, that I cannot bear — by 
speaking of myself, or \^hat I have done, or am prepared 
to do, to seem to vaunt my services before you. But, 
having powerful Protestant connections, and having ray 
whole wealth embarked with theirs, in shipping and 
eommerce, I happily possessed the means of saving your 


182 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


uncle. I have the means of saving you ; and in re* 
demption of my sacred promise, made to him, I am 
here ; pledged not to leave you until I have placed you 
in his arms. The treachery or penitence of one of the 
men about you, led to the discovery of your place of 
confinement ; and that I have forced my way here, 
sword in hand, you see.” 

“ You bring,” said Emma, faltering, “ some note or 
token from my uncle ? ” 

“ No, he doesn’t,” cried Dolly, pointing at him ear- 
nestly : “ now I am sure he doesn’t. Don’t go with 
him for the world ! ” 

“ Hush, pretty fool — be silent,” he replied, frowning 
angrily upon her. “ No, Miss Haredale, I have no letter, 
nor. any token of any kind ; for while I sympathize with 
you, and such as you, on whom misfortune so heavy and 
so undeserved has fallen, I value my life. I carry, there- 
fore, no writing which, found upon me, would lead to its 
certain loss. I never thought of bringing any other 
token, nor did Mr. Haredale think of intrusting me with 
one — possibly because he had good experience of my 
faith and honesty, and owed his life to me.” 

There was a reproof conveyed in these words, which, 
to a nature like Emma Haredale’s, was well addressed. 
But Dolly, who was differently constituted, was by no 
means touched by it, and still conjured her, in all the 
terms of affection and attachment she could think of, 
not to be lured away. 

“Time presses,” said their visitor, who, although he 
sought to express the deepest interest, had something 
eold and even in his speech, that grated on the ear 
“ and danger surrounds us. If I have exposed myself 
to it, in vain, let it be so ; but if you and he should evei 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


18S 


rr !t again, do me justice. If you decide to remain (as 
I hink you do), remember. Miss Haredale, that I left 
yo'i with a solemn caution, and acquitting myself of all 
tic*, consequences to which you expose yourself.” 

“ Stay, sir ! ” cried Emma — “ one moment, I beg 
you. Cannot we ” — and she drew Dolly closer to her 
— “ cannot we go together ? ” 

The task of conveying one female in safety through 
such scenes as we must encounter, to say nothing of at- 
tracting the attention of those who crowd the streets,” 
he answered, “ is enough. I have said that she will be 
restored to her friends to-night. If you accept the ser- 
vice I tender. Miss Haredale, she shall be instantly 
placed in safe conduct, and that promise redeemed. Do 
you decide to remain ? People of all ranks and creeds 
are flying from the town, which is sacked from end to 
end. Let me be of use in some quarter. Do you stay, 
or go ? ” 

“ Dolly,” said Emma, in a hurried manner, “ my dear 
girl, this is our last hope. If we part now, it is only that 
we may meet again in happiness and honor. I will trust 
to this gentleman.” 

« No — no — no ! ” cried Dolly, clinging to her. 
“ Pray, pray, do not ! ” 

“ You hear,” said Emma, “ that to-night — only to- 
night — within a few hours — think of that ! — you will 
be amoi'.g those who would die of grief to lose you, and 
who are now plunged in the deepest misery for your sake. 
Pray for me, dear girl, as I will for you ; and never for- 
get the many quiet hours we have passed together. Say 
one ‘ God bless you ! ’ Say that at parting ! ” 

But Dolly could say nothing ; no, not when Emma 
kissed her cheek a hundred times, and covered it with 


184 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


tears, could slie do more than hang upon her neck, and 
Bob, and clasp, and hold her tight. 

“ We have time for no more of this,” cried the man, 
unclinching her hands, and pushing her roughly off, as 
he drew Emma Haredale towards the door : “ Now ! 
Quick, outside there ! are you ready ? ” 

“ Ay ! ” cried a loud voice, which made him start. 
“ Quite ready ! Stand back here, for your lives ! ” 
And in an instant he was felled like an ox in the 
butcher’s shambles — struck down as though a block of 
marble had fallen from the roof and crushed him — and 
cheerful light, and beaming faces came pouring in — and 
Emma was clasped in her uncle’s embrace, and Dolly, 
with a shriek that pierced the air, fell into the arms of 
her father and mother. 

What fainting there was, what laughing, what crying, 
what sobbing, what smiling, how much questioning, no 
answering, all talking together, all beside themselves 
with joy ; what kissing, congratulating, embracing, shak- 
ing of hands, and falling into all these raptures, over and 
over and over again ; no language can describe. 

At length, and after a long time, the old locksmith 
went up and fairly hugged two strangers, who had stood 
apart and left them to themselves ; and then they saw 
-—whom? Yes, Edward Chester and Joseph Willet. 

“ See here ! ” cried the locksmith. “ See here ! where 
would any of us have been without these two ? Oh, Mr. 
Edward, Mr. Edward — oh, Joe, Joe, how light, and yet 
how full you have made my old heart to-night ! ” 

“ It was Mr. Edward that knocked him down, sir,” 
Baid Joe : “ I longed to do it, but I gave it up to him. 
Come, you brave and honest gentleman ! Get your 
lenses togelhei*, for you haven’t long to lie here.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


185 


He had his foot upon the breast of their sham de- 
liverer, in the absence of a spdre arm ; and gave him a 
gentle roll as he spoke. Gashford, for it was no other, 
crouching, yet malignant, raised his scowling face, like 
sin subdued, and pleaded to be gently used. 

“I have access to all my lord’s papers, Mr. Haredale,** 
he said in a submissive voice : Mr. Haredale keeping his 
back towards him, and not once looking round : “ there 
are very important documents among them. There are a 
great many in secret drawers, and distributed in various 
places, known only to my lord and me. I can give some 
very valuable information, and render important assist- 
ance to any inquiry. You will have to answer it if I 
receive ill usage.” 

‘‘ Pah ! ” cried Joe, in deep disgust. ‘‘ Get up, man ; 
you’re waited for, outside. Get up, do you hear ? ” 

Gashford slowly rose; and picking up his hat, and 
looking with a baffled malevolence, yet with an air of 
despicable humility all round the room, crawled out. 

“ And now, gentlemen,” said Joe, who seemed to be 
the spokesman of the party, for all the rest were silent ; 
“ the sooner we get back to the Black Lion, the better, 
perhaps.” 

Mr. Haredale nodded assent, and drawing his niece's 
arm through his, and taking one of her hands between 
his own, passed out straightway ; followed by the lock- 
smith, Mrs. Varden, and Dolly — who would scarcely 
have presented a sufficient surface for all the hugs and 
caresses they bestowed upon her though she had been 
a dozen Dollys. Edward Chester and Joe followed. 

And did Dolly never once look behind — not once ? 
Was there not one little fleeting glimpse of the dark eye- 
lash, almost resting on her flushed cheek, and of the 


186 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


downcast sparkling eye it shaded? Joe though!, ue.-ft 
was — and he is not likely to have been mistak* . » : for 
there were not many eyes like Dolly’s, that’s the truth. 

The outer room through which they had to pass, was 
full of men ; among them, Mr. Dennis, in safe keeping ; 
and there, had been since yesterday, lying in hiding be- 
hind a wooden screen which was now thrown down, Si- 
mon Tappertit, the recreant ’Prentice, burnt and bruised, 
and with a gun-shot wound in his body ; and his legs — 
his perfect legs, the pride and glory of his life,, the com- 
fort of his whole existence — crushed into shapeless ugli- 
ness. Wondering no longer at the moans they had heard, 
Dolly crept closer to her father, and shuddered at the 
sight: but neither bruises, burns, nor gun-shot wound, 
nor all the torture of his shattered limbs, sent half so 
keen a pang to Simon’s breast, as Dolly passing out, 
with Joe for her preserver. 

A coach was ready at the door, and Dolly found her- 
self safe and whole inside, between her father and mother, 
with Emma Haredale, and her uncle, quite real, sitting 
opposite. But there was no Joe, no Edward ; and they 
had said nothing. They had only bowed once, and kept 
at a distance. Dear heart ! what a long way it wa^ to 
the Black Lion. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


187 


CHAPTER LXXIL 

The Black Lion was so far off, and occupied such a 
length of time in the getting#at, that notwithstanding the 
strong presumptive evidence she had about her of the 
late events being real and of actual occurrence, Dolly 
could not divest herself of the belief that she must be in 
a dream which was lasting all night. Nor was she quite 
certain that she saw and heard with her own proper 
senses, even when the coach, in the fulness of time, 
stopped at the Black Lion, and the host of that tavern 
approached in a gush of cheerful light to help them to 
dismount, and give them hearty welcome. 

There too, at the coach-door, one on one side, one 
upon the other, were already Edward Chester, and Joe 
Willet, who must have followed in another coach : and 
this was such a strange and unaccountable proceeding, 
that Dolly was the more inclined to favor the idea of her 
being fast asleep. But when Mr. Willet appeared — 
old John himself — so heavy-headed and obstinate, and 
with such a double chin as the liveliest imagination could 
never in its boldest flights have conjured up in all iti 
vast proportions — then she stood corrected, and un- 
willingly admitted to herself that she was broad awake 

And Joe had lost an arm — he — that well-made, 
handsome, gallant fellow ! As Dolly glanced towards 
dm, and thought of the pain he must have suffered, and 
- the far-off places in which he had been wandering, and 


188 


BARNABY R JDGE. 


wondered who had been his nurse, and hoped that who- 
ever it was, she had been as kind and gentle and con- 
siderate as she would have been, the tears came rising 
to her bright eyes, one by one, little by little, until she 
could keep them back no longer, and so, before them all, 
wept bitterly. 

“We are all safe now, Dolly,” said her father, kindly, 
“ We shall not be separated any more. Cheer up, my 
love, cheer up ! ” • 

The locksmith’s wife knew better perhaps, than he, 
what ailed her daughter. But Mrs. Varden being quite 
an altered woman — for the riots had done that good — 
added her word to his, and comforted her with similar 
representations. 

“ Mayhap,” said Mr. Willet, senior, looking round 
upon the company, “ she’s hungry. That’s what it is, 
depend upon it — I am myself.” 

The Black Lion, who, like old John, had been wait- 
ing supper past all reasonable and conscionable hours, 
hailed this as a philosophical discovery of the profoundest 
and most penetrating kind ; and the table being already 
spread, they sat down to supper straightway. 

The conversation was not of the liveliest nature, nor 
were the appetites of some among them very keen. Bui 
in both these respects, old John more than atoned for 
any deficiency on the part of the rest, and very much 
distinguished himself. 

It was not in point of actual conversation that Mr. 
Willet shone so brilliantly, for he had none of his old 
jroniesxto “ tackle,” and was rather timorous of ventur- 
ing on .Joe ; having certain vague misgivings within him, 
»hat he was ready on the shortest notice, and on receipt 
of tlie slightest offence, to fell the Black Lion to the 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


189 


floor of his own parlor, and irninediately withdraw to 
China or some other remote and unknown region, there 
to dwell for evermore, or at least until he had got rid 
of his remaining arm and both legs, and perhaps an 
eye or so, into the bargain. It was with a peculiar kind 
of pantomime that Mr. Willet filled up every pause; 
and in this he was considered by the Black Lion, who 
had been his familiar for some years, quite to surpass 
and go beyond himself, and outrun the expectations of 
his most admiring friends. 

The subject that worked in Mr. Willet’s mind, and 
occasioned these demonstrations, was no other than his 
son’s bodily disfigurement, which he had never yet got 
himself thoroughly to believe, or comprehend. Shortly 
after their first meeting, he had been observed to wander, 
in a state of great perplexity, to the kitchen, and to di- 
rect his gaze towards the fire, as if in search of his usual 
adviser in all matters of doubt and difficulty. But there 
being no boiler at the Black Lion, and the rioters having 
so beaten and battered his own that it was quite unfit 
for further service, he wandered out again, in a perfect 
bog of uncertainty *and mental confusion, and in that 
state took the strangest means of resolving his doubts : 
such as feeling the sleeve of his son’s great-coat as deem- 
ing it possible that his arm might be there ; looking at 
his own arms and those of everybody else, as if to assure 
himself that two and not one was the usual allowance 
sitting by the hour together in a brown study, as if he 
were endeavoring to recall Joe’s image in his younger 
days, and to remember whether he really had in those 
times one arm or a pair ; and employing himself in many 
other speculations of the same kind. 

Finding himself at this supper, surrounded by faces 


190 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


with which lie had been so well acquainted in old 
times, Mr. Willet recurred to the subject with uncom- 
mon vigor; apparently resolved to understand it now or 
never. Sometimes, after every two or three mouthfuls, 
he laid down his knife and fork, and stared at his son 
with all his might — particularly at his maimed side ; 
then, he looked slowly round the table until he caught 
some person’s eye, when he shook his head with great 
solemnity, patted his shoulder, winked, or as one may 
say — for winking was a very slow process with him — 
went to sleep with one eye for a minute or two ; and so, 
with another solemn shaking of his head, took up his 
knife and fork again, and went on eating. Sometimes, 
he put his food into his mouth abstractedly, and, with all 
his faculties concentrated on Joe, gazed at him in a fit 
of stupefaction as he cut his meat with one hand, until 
he was recalled to himself -by symptoms of choking on 
his own part, and was by that means restored to con- 
sciousness. At other times he resorted to such small 
devices as asking him for the salt, the pepper, the vine- 
gar, the mustard — anything that was on his maimed 
side — and watching him as he handed it. By dint of 
these experiments, he did at last so satisfy and convince 
himself, that, after a longer silence than he had yet main- 
tained, he laid down his knife and fork on either side his 
plate, drank a long draught from a tankard beside him 
(still keeping his eyes on Joe) and leaning backward in 
his chair and fetching a long breath, said, as* he looked 
all round the board : — 

“ It’s been took off ! ” 

“ By George ! ” said the Black Lion, striking the table 
with his hand, “ he’s got it ! ” 

Yes, sir,” said Mr. Willet, with the look of a man 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


191 


who felt that he had earned a compliment, and deserved 
it. That’s where it is. It’s been took off.” 

“ Tell him where it w'as done,” said the Black Lion tc 

Joe. 

“ At the defence of the Savannah, father.” 

“ At the defence of the Salwanners,” repeated Mr 
Willet, softly ; again looking round the table. 

In America, where the war is,” said Joe. 

“ In America, where the war is,” repeated Mr. Willet. 
“ It was took off in the defence of the Salwanners in 
America where the war is.” Continuing to repeat these 
words to himself in a low tone of voice (the same infor- 
mation had been conveyed to him in the same terms, at 
least fifty times before), Mr. Willet arose from table, 
walked round to Joe, felt his empty sleeve all the way 
up, from the cuff to where the stump of his arm re- 
mained ; shook his hand ; lighted his pipe at the fire, 
took a long whiff, walked to the door, turned round once 
when he had reached it, wiped his left eye with the back 
of his forefinger, and said, in a faltering voice : “ My 
son’s arm — was took off — at the defence of the — 
Salw'anners — in America — where the war is ” — with 
which words he withdrew, and returned no more that 
night. 

Indeed, on various pretences, they all witlidrew one 
after another, save Dolly, who was left sitting there 
alone. It was a great relief to be alone, and she was 
crying to her heart’s content, when she heai-d Joe’s voice 
at the end of the passage, bidding somebody good-night. 

Good-night! Then he was going elsewhere — to some 
distance, perhaps. To what kind of home could he be go- 
ing now that it was so late I 

She heard him walk along the passage, and pass the 


192 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


door. But there was a hesitation in his footsteps. He 
turned back — Dolly’s heart beat high — he looked in. 

“ Good -night ! ” — he didn’t say Dolly,, but there was 
comfort in his not saying Miss Varden. 

“ Good-night ! ” sobbed Dolly. 

“ I am sorry you take on so much, for what is past 
and gone,” said Joe kindly. “ Don’t. I can’t bear to 
see you do it. Think of it no longer. You are safe and 
happy now.” 

Dolly cried the more. 

“ You must have suffered very much within these few 
days — and yet you’re not changed, unless it’s for the bet- 
ter. They said you were, but I don’t see it. You were — 
you were always very beautiful,” said Joe, “ but you are 
more beautiful than ever, now. You are indeed. There 
can be no harm in my saying so, for you must know it. 
You are told so very often, I am sure.” 

As a general principle, Dolly did know it, and ivas told 
so, very often. But the coach-maker had turned out, 
years ago, to be a special donkey ; and whether she 
had been afraid of making similar discoveries in others, 
or had grown by dint of long custom to be careless of 
compliments generally, certain it is that although she 
cried so much, she was -better pleased to be told so 
now, than ever she had been in all her life. 

“I shall bless your name,” sobbed the locksmith’s 
little daughter, “as long as I live. I shall never hear 
it spoken without feeling as if my heart would burst. 
I shall remember it in my prayers, every night and 
morning till I die ! ” 

“ Will you ? ” said Joe, eagerly. “ Will you indeed ? 
It makes me — well, it makes me very glad and proud 
to hear you say so.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


m 

Dolly Still sobbed, and held her handkerchief to. her 
eyes. Joe still stood looking at her. 

“ Your voice,” said Joe, “ brings up old times so pleas- 
antly, that, for the moment, I feel as if that night — - 
there can. be no harm in talking of that night now — 
had come back, and nothing had happened in the mean 
time. I feel as if I hadn’t suffered any hardships, but 
had knocked down poor Tom Cobb only yesterday^ and 
had come to see you with my bundle on my shoulder be- 
fore running away — You remember ? ” ’ ' 

Remember ! But she said nothing. She raised her 
eyes for an instant. It was but a glance ; a little, tear- 
ful, timid glance. It kept Joe silent though, for a long 
time. 

“ Well ! ” he said stoutly, “ it was to be otherwise, and 
was. I have been abroad, fighting all the summer and 
frozen up all the winter, ever since. I have come back 
as poor in purse as I went, and crippled for life besides. 
But, Dolly, I would rather have lost this other arm — 
ay, I would rather have lost my head — than have come 
back to find you dead, or anything but what I always 
pictured you to myself, and what I always hoped and 
wished to find you. Thank God for all ! ” 

Oh how much, and how keenly, the little coquette of 
five years ago, felt now ! She had found her heart at 
last. Never having known its worth till now, she had 
never known the worth of his. How priceless it ap- 
peared ! 

“ I did hope once,” said Joe, in his homely way, “ that 
I might come back a rich man, and marry you. But I 
was a boy then, and have long known better than that. 
I am a poor, maimed, discharged soldier, and must be 
content to rub through life as I can. I can’t say, even 

VOL. lU. 13 


194 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


now, tbat I shall be glad to see you married, Dolly ; but 
I am glad — yes, I am, and glad to think I can say so — 
to know that you are admired and courted, and can pick 
and choose for a happy life. It’s a comfort to me to 
know that you’ll talk to your husband about me ; and I 
hope the time will come when I may be able to like him, 
and to shake hands with him, and to come and see you as 
a poor friend who knew you when you were a girl. God 
bless you ! ” 

His hand did tremble ; but for all that, he took it away 
again, and left her. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


]95 


CHAPTER LXXIII. 

By this Friday night — for it was on Friday in the 
riot week, that Emma and Dolly were rescued, by the 
timely aid of Joe and Edward Chester — the distur- 
bances were entirely quelled, and peace and order were 
restored to the affrighted city. True, after what had 
happened, it was impossible for any man to say how 
long this better state of things might last, or how sud- 
denly new outrages, exceeding even those so lately wit- 
nessed, might burst forth and fill its streets with ruin 
and bloodshed ; for this reason, those who had fled from 
the recent tumults still kept at'a distance, and many fam- 
ilies, hitherto unable to procure the means of flight, now 
availed themselves of the calm, and withdrew into the 
country. The shops, too, from Tyburn to Whitechapel, 
were still shut ; and very little business was transacted 
in any of the places of great commercial resort. But, 
notwithstanding, and in spite of the melancholy fore- 
bodings of that numerous class of society who see with 
the greatest clearness into the darkest perspectives, the 
town remained profoundly quiet. The strong military 
force disposed in every advantageous quarter, and sta- 
tioned at every commanding “point, held the scattered 
fragments of the mob in check ; the search after rioters 
was prosecuted with unrelenting vigor ; and if there 
were any among them so desperate and reckless as to 
be inclined, after the terrible scenes they had beheld, 


196 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


to venture forth again, they were so daunted by these 
resolute measures, that they quickly shrunk into their 
hiding-places, and had no thought but for their personal 
safety. 

In a word, the crowd was utterly routed. Upwards 
of two hundred had been shot dead in the streets. Two 
hundred and fifty more were lying, badly wounded, in 
the hospitals ; of whom seventy or eighty died within a 
short time afterwards. A hundred were already in cus- 
tody, and more were taken every hour. How many 
perished in the conflagrations, or by their own excesses, 
is unknown ; but that numbers found a terrible grave 
in the hot ashes of the flames they had kindled, or crept 
into vaults and cellars to drink in secret or to nurse 
their sores, and never saw the light again, is certain. 
When the embers of the fires had been black, and cold 
for many weeks, the laborers’ spades proved this, beyond 
a doubt. 

Seventy-two private houses and four strong jails were 
destroyed in the four great days of these riots. The 
total loss of property, as estimated by the sufferers, was 
one hundred and fifty-five thousand pounds ; at the 
lowest and least partial estimate of disinterested per- 
sons, it exceeded one hundred and twenty-five thousand 
pounds. For this immense loss, compensation was soon 
afterwards made out of the public purse, in pursuance 
of a vote of the House of Commons ; the sum being 
levied on the various wards in the city, on the county, 
and the borough of Southwark. Both Lord Mansfield 
and Lord Saville, however, who had been great sufferers, 
refused to accept of any compensation whatever. 

The House of Commons, sitting on Tuesday with 
locked and guarded doors, had passed a resolution to 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


197 


the effect that, as soon as the tumults subsided, it would 
j immediately proceed to consider the petitions presented 
I from many of his majesty’s Protestant subjects, and 
j would take the same into its serious consideration, 
h While this question was under debate, Mr. Herbert, 
\ one -of the members present, indignantly rose and called 
upon the House to observe that Lord George Gordon 

■ was then sitting under the gallery with the blue cock- 
ade, the signal of rebellion, in his hat. He was not 
only obliged, by those* who sat near, to take it out ; but 

; offering to go into the street to pacify the mob with the 

■ somewhat indefinite assurance that the House was pre- 
' pared to give them “ the satisfaction they sought,” was 
I actually held down in his seat by the combined force 

of several members. In short, the disorder and vio- 
lence which reigned triumphant out of doors, penetrated 
into the . senate, and there, as elsewhere, terror and 
alarm prevailed, and ordinary forms were for the time 
forgotten. 

On the Thursday, both Houses had adjourned until 
the following Monday se’nnight, declaring it impossible 
to pursue their deliberations with the necessary gravity 
and freedom, while they were surrounded by armed 
troops. And now that the rioters were dispersed, the 
citizens were beset with a new fear; for, finding the 
public thoroughfares and all their usual places of resort 
filled with soldiers intrusted with the free use of fire 
and sword, they began to lend a greedy ear to the ru- 
mors which were afloat of martial law being declared, 
and to dismal stories of prisoners having been seen hang- 
ing on lamp-posts in Cheapside and Fleet-street. These 
terrors being promptly dispelled by a Proclamation de- 
vdaring that all the rioters in custody would be tried by 


198 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


a special commission in due course of law, a fresh alarm 
was engendered by its being whispered abroad that 
French money had been found on some of the rioters, 
and ihat the disturbances had been fomented by for- 
eign powers who sought to compass the overthrow and 
ruin of England. This report, which was strengthened 
by the diffusion of anonymous hand-bills, but which, if 
it had any foundation at all, probably owed its origin 
to the circumstance of some few coins which were not 
English money having been swept* into the pockets of 
the insurgents with other miscellaneous booty, and after- 
wards discovered on the prisoners or the dead bodies, 
— caused a great sensation ; and men’s minds being in 
that excited state when they are most apt to catch at 
any shadow of apprehension, was bruited about with 
much industry. 

All remaining quiet, however, during the whole of 
this Friday, and on this Friday night, and no new dis- 
coveries being made, confidence began to be restored, 
and the most timid and desponding breathed again. In 
Southwark, no fewer than three thousand of tlie inhab- 
itants formed themselves into a watch, and patrolled 
the streets every hour. Nor were the citizens slow to 
follow so good an example: and it being the manner 
of peaceful men to be very bold when the danger is 
over, they were abundantly fierce and daring ; not 
scrupling to question the stoutest passenger with great 
severity, and carrying it with a very high hand over 
all errand-boys, servant-girls, and ’prentices. 

As day deepened into evening, and darkness crept 
into the nooks and corners of the town as if it were 
mustering in secret and gathering strength .to venture 
into the open ways, Barnaby sat in his dungeon, won- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


199 


dering at the silence, and listening in vain for the noise 
and outcry which had ushfered in the night of late. 
Beside him, with his hand in hers, sat one in whose 
companionship he felt at peace. She was worn and 
altered, full of grief, and heavy-hearted ; but the same 
to him. 

“ Mother,” he said, after a long silence : “ how long, 
— how many days and nights, — shall I be kept here ? ” 
“Not many, dear. I hope not many.” 

“ You hope ! Ay, but your hoping will not undo 
these chains. 1 hope, but they don’t mind that. Grip 
hopes, but who scares for Grip ? ” 

The raven gave a short, dull, melancholy croak. It 
said “ Nobody,” as plainly as a croak could speak. 

“ Who cares for Grip, excepting you and me ? ” said 
Barnaby, smoothing the bird’s rumpled feathers with 
his hand. “ He never speaks in this place ; he never 
says a word in jail ; he sits and mopes all day in this 
dark corner, dozing sometimes, and sometimes looking 
at the light that creeps in through the bars, and shines 
in his bright eye as if a spark from those great fires 
had fallen into the room and was burning yet. But 
who cares for Grip ? ” 

The raven croaked again — Nobody. 

“And by the way,” said Barnaby, withdrawing his 
hand from the bird, and laying it upon his mother’s 
arm, as he looked eagerly in her face ; “ if they kill 
me — they may : I heard it said they would — what 
will become of Grip when I am dead ? ” 

The sound of the word, or the current of his own 
thoughts, suggested to Grip his old phrase “ Never 
say die ! ” But he stopped short in the middle of it, 
drew a dismal cork, and subsided into a faint croak, 


200 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


as if he lacked the heart to get through the shortest 
sentence. 

“ Will they take his life as well as mine ? ” said Bar- 
naby. I wish they would. If you and I and he could 
die together, there would be none to feel sorry, or to 
grieve for us. But do what they will, I don’t fear 
them, mother ! ” 

“ They will not harm you,” she said, her tears chok- 
ing her utterance. “ They never will harm you, when 
they know all. I am sure they never will. ” 

“ Oh ! Don’t you be too sure of that,” cried Bar- 
naby, with a strange pleasure in the belief that she was 
self-deceived, and in his own sagacity. “ They have 
marked me, mother, from the first. I heard them say 
so to each other when they brought me to this place 
last night ; and I believe them. Don’t you cry for me. 
They said that T was bold, and so I am, and so I will 
be. You may think that I am silly, but I can die as 
well as another. — 1 have done no harm, have I ? ” he 
added quickly. 

“ None before Heaven,” she answered. 

“ Why then,” said Barnaby, “ let them do their worst. 
You told me once — you — when I asked you what 
death meant, that it was nothing to be feared, if we did 
no harm — Aha ! mother, you thought I had forgotten 
that ! ” 

His merry laugh and playful manner smote her to 
the heart. She drew him closer to her, and besought 
him to talk to her in whispers, and to be very quiet, for 
ft was getting dark, and their time was short, and she 
would soon have to leave him for the night. 

“ You will come to-morrow ? ” said Barnaby. 

Yes. And every day. And they would never part 
^ain. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


201 


He joyfully replied that this was well, and what he 
wished, and what he had felt quite certain she would 
tell him ; and then he asked her where she had been 
so long, and why she had not come to see him when he 
was a great soldier, and ran through the wild schemes 
he had had for their being rich and living prosperously, 
and, with some faint notion in his mind that she wae 
sad and he had made her so, tried to console and com- 
fort her, and talked of their former life and his old 
sports and freedom : little dreaming that every word he 
uttered only increased her sorrow, and that her tears 
fell faster at the freshened recollection of their lost 
tranquillity. 

“ Mother,” said Barnaby, as they heard the man ap- 
proaching to close the cells for the night, “when I spoke 
to you just now about my father you cried ‘ Hush ! * and 
turned away your head. Why did you do so? Tell 
me why, in a word. You thought he was dead. You 
are not sorry that he is alive and has come back to us. 
Where is he? Here?” 

“ Do not ask any one where he is, or speak about 
him,” she made answer. 

“ Why not ? ” said Barnaby. “ Because he is a stern 
man, and talks roughly ? Well, I don’t like him, or 
want to be with him by myself ; but why not speak about 
him ? ” 

“ Because I am sorry that he is alive ; sori-y that he 
has come back ; and sorry that he and you have ever 
met. Because, dear Barnaby, the endeavor of my life 
has been to keep you two asunder.” 

“ Father and son asunder ! Why ? ” 

“ He has,” she whispered in his ear, “ he has shed 
blood. The time has come when you must know it 


202 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


He nas slied the blood of one who loved him well^ 
and trusted h'm, and never did him wrong in word oi 
deed.” 

Barnaby recoiled in horror, and glancing at his stained 
wrist for an instant, wrapped it, shuddering, in his dress. 

“ But,” she added hastily as the key turned in the 
lock, “ and although we shun him, he is your father, 
dearest, and I am his wretched wife. They seek his 
life, and he will lose it. It must not be by our means ; 
nay, if we could win him back to penitence, we should 
be bound to love him yet. Do not seem to know him, 
except as one who fled with you from the jail, and if 
they question you about him, do not answer them. God 
be with you through the night, dear boy ! God be with 
you ! ” 

She tore herself away, and in a few seconds Barnaby 
was alone. He stood for a long time rooted to the spot, 
with his face hidden in his hands ; then flung himself, 
sobbing, upon his miserable bed. 

But the moon came slowly up in all her gentle glory, 
and the stars looked out, and through the small compass 
of the grated window, as through the narrow crevice of 
one good deed in a murky life of guilt, the face of 
Heaven shone bright and merciful. He raised his head ; 
gazed upward at the quiet sky, which seemed to smile 
upon the earth in sadness, as if the night, more thought- 
ful than the day, looked down in sorrow on the sufferings 
and evil deeds of men ; and felt its peace sink deep 
into his heart. He, a poor idiot, caged in his narrow 
cell, was as much lifted up to God, while gazing on the 
mild light, as the freest and most favored man in all the 
spacious city ; and in his ill-remembered prayer, and in 
the fragment of the childish hymn, with which he sung 


BAliNABY liUDGE. 


203 


and crooned himself asleep, there breathed as true a 
spirit as every studied homily expressed, or ol j cathe- 
dral arches echoed. 

As his mother crossed a yard on her way out, she 
saw, through a grated door which separated it from 
another court, her husband, walking round and round, 
with his hands folded on his breast, and his head hung 
down. She asked the man who conducted her, if she 
might speak a word with this prisoner. Yes, but she 
must be quick, for he was locking up for the night, and 
there was but a minute or so to spare. Saying this, he 
unlocked the door, and bade her go in. 

It grated harshly as it turned upon its hinges, but he 
was deaf to the noise, and still walked round and round 
the little court, without raising his head or changing his 
attitude in the least. She spoke to him, but her voice 
was weak, and failed her. At length she put herself in 
his track, and when he came near, stretched out her 
hand and touched him. 

He staited backward, trembling from head to foot ; 
but seeing who it was, demanded why she came there. 
Before she could reply, he spoke again. 

“ Am I to live or die ? Do you do murder toe, or 
spare ? ” 

“My son — our son,” she answered, “is in this prison.” 

“What is that to me?” he cried, stamping impatiently 
on the stone pavement. “ I know it. He can no more 
aid me than I can aid him. If you are come to talk of 
him, begone ! ” ^ 

As he spoke he resumed his walk, and hurried round 
the court as before. When he came again to where she 
Stood: he stepped, and said, — 

“ Am I to live or die ^ Do you repent ? ” 


204 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ Oh ! — do you ? ” she answered. “ Will you, while 
time remains ? Do not believe that I could save you, 
if I dared.” 

“ Say if you would,” he answered with an oath as he 
tried to disengage himself and pass on. “ Say if you 
would.” 

“ Listen to me for one moment,” she returned ; “ for 
but a moment. I am but newly risen from a sick-bed, 
from which I never hoped to rise again. The best 
among us think, at such a time, of good intentions half- 
performed and duties left undone. If I have ever, since 
that fatal night, omitted to pray for your repentance be- 
fore death — if I omitted, even then, anything which 
might tend to urge it on you when the horror of your 
crime was fresh — if, in our later meeting, I yielded to 
the dread that was upon me, and forgot to fall upon my 
knees and solemnly adjure you, in the name of him you 
sent to his account with Heaven, to prepare for the ret- 
ribution which must come, and which is stealing on you 
now — I humbly before you, and in the agony of sup- 
plication in which you see me, beseech that you will let 
me make atonement.” 

“What is the meaning of your canting words?” he an- 
swered roughly. “ Speak so that I may understand you.’ 

“ I will,” she answered, “ I desire to. Bear with me 
for a moment more. The hand of Him who set his 
curse on murder, is heavy on us now. You cannot 
iloubt it. Our son, our innocent boy, on whom His an- 
ger fell before his birth, is in this plac« in peril of his 
life — brought here by your guilt ; yes, by that alone, 
as Heaven sees and knows, for he has been led astray 
in the darkness of his intellect, and that is the terrible 
consequence of your crime.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


205 


“ If you come, woman-like, to load me with re- 
proaches ” — he muttered, again endeavoring to break 
away. 

— “ I do not. I have a different purpose. You must 
hear it. If not to-night, to-morrow ; if not to-morrow, 
at another time. You must hear it. Husband, escape 
is hopeless — impossible.” 

“ You tell me so, do you ? ” he said, raising his man- 
acled hand, and shaking it. “ You ! ” 

“ Yes,” she said with indescribable earnestness. “ But 
why ? ” ' 

“ To make me easy in this jail. To make the time 
'twixt this and death, pass pleasantly. For my good — 
yes, for my good, of course,” he said, grinding his teeth, 
and smiling at her with a livid face. 

“ Not to load you with reproaches,” she replied ; “ not 
to aggravate the tortures and miseries of your condition 
not to give you one hard word, but to restore you to 
peace and hope. Husband, dear husband, if you will 
but confess this dreadful crime ; if you will but implore 
forgiveness of Heaven and of those whom you have 
wronged on earth ; if you will dismiss these vain un- 
easy thoughts, which never can be realized, and will 
rely on Penitence and on the Truth, I promise you, in 
the . great name of the* Creator, whose image you have 
defaced, that He will comfort and console you. And 
for myself,” she cried, clasping her hands, and looking 
upward, “ I swear before Him, as He knows my hear 
and reads it now, that from that hour I wdll love ana 
cherish you as I did of old, and watch you night and 
day in the short interval that will remain to us, and 
soothe you with my truest love and duty, and pray with 
you, that one threatening judgment may be arrested, and 


206 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


lhat our boy may be spared to bless God, in his poor 
way, in the free air and light ! ” 

He fell back and gazed at her while she poured out 
these words, as though he were for a moment awed by 
her manner, and knew not what to do. But anger and 
fear soon got the mastery of him, and he spurned her 
from him. 

“ Begone ! ” he cried. “ Leave me ; You plot, do 
you ! You plot to get speech with me, and let them 
know I am the man they say I am. A curse on you 
and on your boy.” 

“ On him the curse has already fallen,” she replied, 
wringing her hands. 

“ Let it fall heavier. Let it fall on one and all. I 
hate you both. The worst has come to me. The only 
comfort that I seek or I can have, will be the knowledge 
that it comes to you. Now go ! ” 

She would have urged him gently, even then, but he 
menaced her with his chain. 

“ I say go — I say it for the last time. The gallows 
has me in its grasp, and it is a black phantom that may 
urge me on to something more. Begone ! I curse the 
hour that I was born, the man I slew, and all the living 
world ! ” 

In a paroxysm of wrath, and terror, and the fear of 
death, he broke from her, and rushed into the darkness 
of his cell, where he cast himself jangling down upon 
the stone floor, and smote it with his iron hands. The 
man returned to lock the dungeon-door, and having done 
80, carried her away. 

On that warm, balmy night in June, there were glad 
faces and light hearts in all quarters of the town, and 
sleep, banished by the late horrors, was doubly welcomed. 


BAUNABY KUDGE. 


20 / 


On that night, families made meiTy in their houses, and 
'greeted each other on the common danger they had 
escaped ; and those who had been denounced, ventured 
into the streets ; and they who had been plundered, got 
good shelter. Even the timorous Lord Mayor, who was 
eummoned that night before the Privy Council to an* 
swer for his conduct, came back contented ; observing to 
all his friends that he had got off very well with a repri- 
mand, and repeating with huge satisfaction his memo- 
rable defence before the Council, “ that such was his 
temerity, he thought death would have been his potion.” 

On that night, too, more of the scattered remnants of 
the mob were traced to their lurking-places, and taken ; 
and in the hospitals, and deep among the ruins they had 
made, and in the ditches, and the fields, many unshrouded 
wretches lay dead : envied by those who had been active 
in the disturbances, and who pillowed their doomed heads 
in the temporary jails. 

And in the Tower, in a dreary room whose thick stone 
walls shut out the hum of life, and made a stillness which 
the records left by former prisoners with those silent wit- 
nesses seemed to deepen and intensify ; remorseful for 
every act that had been done by every man among the 
cruel crowd ; feeling for the time their guilt his own, and 
their lives put in peril by himself ; and finding, amidst 
such reflections, little comfort in fanaticism, or in his 
fancied call ; sat the unhappy author of all — Lord 
George Gordon. 

He had been made prisoner that evening. “ If yoii 
are sure it’s me you want,” he said to the officer, who 
waited outside with the warrant for his arrest on a 
charge of High Treason, “ I am ready to accompany 
you” — which he did without resistance. He was con- 


208 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


ducted first before the Privy Council, and afterwards ^ 
the Horse Guards, and then was taken by way of West- 
minster Bridge, and back over London Bridge (for the 
purpose of avoiding the main streets), to the Tower, 
under the strongest guard ever known to enter its gates 
with a single prisoner. 

Of all his forty thousand men, not one remained to 
bear him company. Friends, dependents, followers, — 
none were there. His fawning secretary had played 
the traitor; and he whose weakness had been goaded 
and urged on by so many for their own purposes, was 
desolate and alone. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


209 


CHAPTER LXXIV. 

Mb. Dennis, having been made prisoner late in the 
evening, was removed to a neighboring round-house for 
that night, and carried before a justice for examination 
on the next day, Saturday. The charges against him 
being numerous and weighty, and it being in particular 
proved, by the testimony of Gabriel Yarden, that he had 
shown a special desire to take his life, he was committed 
for trial. Moreover he was honored with the distinction 
of being considered a chief among the insurgents, and 
received from the magistrate’s lips the complimentary 
assurance that he was in a position of imminent danger, 
and would do well to prepare himself for the worst. 

To say that Mr. Dennis’s modesty was not somewhat 
startled by these honors, or that he was altogether pre- 
pared for so flattering a reception, would be to claim for 
him a greater amount of stoical philosophy than even he 
possessed. Indeed this gentleman’s stoicism was of that 
not uncommon kind, which enables a man to bear with 
exemplary fortitude the afflictions of his friends, but 
renders him, by way of counterpoise, rather selfish and 
sensitive in respect of any that happen to befall himself. 
It is therefore no disparagement to the great officer in 
v|uestiou to state, without disguise or concealment, that 
he was at first very much alarmed, and that he betrayed 
divers emotions of fear, until his reasoning powers came 
to his relief, and set before him a more hopeful prospect. 

v.)i,. III. 14 


210 


BARNABY RUDGE- 


In proportion as Mr. Dennis exercised these intel- 
lectual qualities with which he was gifted, in reviewing 
his best chapces of coming off handsomely and with small 
personal inconvenience, his spirits rose, and his confi- 
dence increased. When he remembered the great esti- 
mation in which his office was held, and the constant 
demand for his services ; when he bethought himself, 
how the Statute Book regarded him as a kind of Univer- 
sal Medicine applicable to men, women, and children, of 
every age and variety of criminal constitution ; and how 
high he stood, in his official capacity, in the favor of the 
Crown, and both Houses of Parliament, the Mint, the 
Bank of England, and the Judges of the land ; when he 
recollected that whatever ministry was in or out, he re- 
mained their peculiar pet and panacea, and that for his 
sake England stood single and conspicuous among the 
civilized nations of the earth : when he called these 
things to mind and dwelt upon them, he felt certain that 
the national gratitude must relieve him from the con- 
sequences of his late proceedings, and would certainly 
restore him to his old place in the happy social sys- 
tem. 

With these crumbs, or as one may say, with these 
whole loaves of comfort to regale upon, Mr. Dennis took 
his place among the escort that awaited him, and re- 
paired to jail with a manly indifference. Arriving at 
Newgate, where some of the ruined cells had been 
hastily fitted up for the safe-keeping of rioters, he was 
warmly received by the turnkeys, as an unusual and in- 
teresting case, which agreeably relieved their monoto- 
nous duties. In this spirit, he was fettered with great 
care, and conveyed into the interior of the prison. 

“ Brother,” cried the hangman, as, following an officer, 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


211 


he traversed under these novel circumstances the remains 
of passages with which he was well acquainted, “ am I 
going to be along with anybody ? ” 

“ If you’d have left more walls standing, you’d have 
been alone,” was the reply. “ As it is, we’re cramped 
for room, and you’ll have company.” 

“ Well,” returned Dennis, “ I don’t object to com- 
pany, brother. I rather like company. I was formed 
for society, I was.” 

“ That’s rather a pity, a’n’t it ? ” said the man. 

“ No,” answered Dennis, “ I’m not aware that it is. 
Why should it be a pity, brother?” 

“ Oh ! I don’t know,” said the man carelessly. “ I 
thought that was what you meant. Being formed for 
society, and being cut off in your flower, you know ” — 

“ I say,” interposed the other quickly, what are you 
talking of? Don’t. Who’s a-going to be cut off in their 
flowers ? 

“ Oh, nobody particular. . I thought you was, per- 
haps,” said the man. 

Mr. Dennis wiped his face, which had suddenly grown 
very hot, and remarking in a tremulous voice to his con- 
ductor that he had always been fond of his joke, followed 
him in silence until he stopped at a door. 

“ This is my quarters, is it ? ” he asked facetiously. 

“ This is the shop, sir,” replied his friend. 

He was walking in, but not with the best possible 
grace, when he suddenly stopped, and started back. 

“ Halloa ! ” said the officer. “ You’re nervous.” 

“Nervous!” whispered Dennis in great alarm. “Well 
f may be. Shut the door.” 

“ I will, when you’re in,” returned the man. 

“ But I can’t go in there,” whispered Dennis. “ I 


212 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


can’t be shut up with that man. Do you want me to 
be throttled, brother ? ” 

The officer seemed to entertain no particular desire on 
the subject one way or other, but briefly remarking that 
he had his orders, and intended to obey them, pushed 
him in, turned the key, and retired. 

Dennis stood trembling with his back against the door, 
and involuntarily raising his arm to defend himself, 
stared at a man, the only other tenant of the cell, who 
lay, stretched at his full length, upon a stone bench, and 
who paused in his deep breathing as if he were about to 
wake. But he rolled over on one side, let his arm fall 
negligently down, drew a long sigh, and murmuring in- 
distinctly, fell fast asleep again. 

Relieved in some degree by this, the hangman took 
his eyes for an instant from the slumbering figure, and 
glanced round the cell in search of some ’vantage-ground 
or weapon of defence. There was nothing movable 
within it, but a clumsy table,which could not be displaced 
without noise, and a heavy chair. Stealing on tiptoe 
towards this latter piece of furniture, he retired with it 
into the remotest corner, and intrenching himself behind 
it, watched the enemy with the utmost vigilance and 
caution. 

The sleeping man was Hugh ; and perhaps it was not 
unnatural for Dennis to feel in a state of very uncom- 
fortable suspense, and to wish with his whole soul that 
he might never wake again. Tired of standing, he 
crouched down in his corner after some time, and rested 
on the cold pavement; but although Hugh’s breathing 
still proclaimed that he \vas sleeping soundly, he could 
not trust him out of his sight for an instant. He was so 
afraid of him, and of some sudden onslaught, that he was 


BAKNABY BUDGE. 


213 


not content to see his closed eyes through the chair-back, 
but every now and then, rose stealthily to his feet, and 
peered at him with outstretched neck, to assure himself 
that he really was still asleep, and was not about to 
spring upon him when he was off his guard. 

He slept so long and so soundly, that Mr. Dennis be- 
gan to think he might sleep on until the turnkey visited 
them. He was congratulating himself upon these prom- 
ising appearances, and blessing his stars with much fer- 
vor, when one or two unpleasant symptoms manifested 
themselves : such as another motion of the arm, another 
sigh, a restless tossing of the head. Then, just as it 
seemed that he was about to fall heavily to the ground 
from his narrow bed, Hugh’s eyes opened. 

It happened that his face was turned directly towards 
his unexpected visitor. He looked lazily at him for some 
half-dozen seconds without any aspect of surprise or rec- 
ognition ; then suddenly jumped up, and with a great 
oath pronounced his name. 

“ Keep off, brother, keep off!” cried Dennis, dodging 
behind the chair. “ Don’t do me a mischief. I’m a 
prisoner like you. I haven’t the free use of ray limbs. 
I’m quite an old man. Don’t hurt me ! ” 

He whined out the last three words in such piteous 
accents, that Hugh, who had dragged away the chair, and 
aimed a blow at him with it, checked himself, and bade 
him get up. 

“ I’ll* get up certainly, brother,” cried Dennis, anxious 
to propitiate him by any means in his power, “ I’ll com- 
ply wdth any request of yours. I’m sure. There — I’m 
up now. What can I do for you ? Only say the word, 
^nd I’ll do it.” 

“ What can you do for me ! ” cried Hugh, clutching 


214 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


him by the collar with both hands, and shaking him as 
though he were bent on stopping his breath by that 
means. “ What have you done for me ? ” 

“The best. The best that could be done,” returned 
the hangman. 

Hugh made him no answer, but shaking him in his 
strong gripe until his teeth chattered in his head, cast 
him down upon the floor, and flung himself on the bench 
again. 

“ If it wasn’t for the comfort it is to me, to see you 
here,” he muttered, “ I’d have crushed your head against 
it; I would.” 

It was some time before Dennis had breath enough to 
speak, but as soon as he could resume his propitiatory 
strain, he did so. 

“I did the best that could be done, brother,” he 
whined ; “ I did indeed. I was forced with two bayo- 
nets and I don’t know how many bullets on each side of 
me, to point you out. If you hadn’t, been taken, you’d 
have been shot ; and what a sight that would have been 
— a fine young man like you ! ” 

“ Will it be a better sight now ? ” asked Hugh, raising 
his head, with such a fierce expression, that the other 
durst not answer him just then. 

“ A deal better,” said Dennis meekly, after a pause. 
“ First, there’s all the chances of the law, and they’re 
five hundred strong. We may get off scot-free. Un- 
likelier things than that, have come to pass. Even if we 
shouldn’t, and the chances fail, we can but be worked off 
unce : and when it’s well done, it’s so neat, so skilful, so 
■japtiwating, if that don’t seem too strong a word, that 
you’d hardly believe it could bo brought to sich perfec- 
tion. Kill one’s fellow-creeturs off, with muskets ! — 


BARNABY RUDGE. 215 

Pah ! ” and his nature so revolted at the bare idea, that 
he spat upon the dungeon pavement. 

Hi s warming on this topic, which to one unacquainted 
with his pursuits and tastes appeared like courage ; to- 
gether with his artful suppression of his own secret 
hopes, and mention of himself as being in the same con- 
dition with Hugh ; did more to soothe that ruffian than 
the most elaborate arguments could have done, or the 
most abject submission. He rested his arms upon his 
knees, and stooping forward, looked from beneath his 
shaggy hair at Dennis, with something of a smile upon 
his face. 

“ The fact is, brother,” said the hangman, in a tone of 
greater confidence, “that you got into bad company. 
The man that was with you was looked after more than 
you, and it was him I wanted. As to me, what have I 
got by it ? Here we are, in one and the same plight.” 

“ Lookee, rascal,” said Hugh, contracting his brows, 
“I’m not altogether such a shallow blade but I know 
you expected to get something by it, or you wouldn’t 
have done it. But it’s done, and you’re here, and it will 
soon be all over with you and me ; and I’d as soon die 
as live, or live as die. Why should I trouble myself to 
have revenge on you ? To eat, and drink, and go to 
sleep, as long as I stay here, is all I care for. If there 
was but a little more sun to bask in, than can find its 
way into this cursed place. I’d lie in it all day, and not 
trouble myself to sit or stand up once. That’s all the 
care I have for myself. Why should I care for you / ” 

Finishing this speech with a growl like the yawn of a 
wild beast, he stretched himself upon the bench again, 
»nd closed his eyes once more. 

After looking at him in silence for some moments, 


216 


BARNABY KUDGE. 


Dennis, who was greatly relieved to find him in this 
mood, drew the chair towards his rough couch and sat 
down near him — taking the precaution, however, to 
keep out of the range of his brawny arm. 

“ Well said, brother ; nothing could be better said,” 
he ventured to observe. “ We’ll eat and drink of the 
best, and sleep our best, and make the best of it every 
way. Anything can be got for money. Let’s spend it 
merrily.” 

“ Ay,” said Hugh, coiling himself into a new position. 
— “ Where is it ? ” 

“Why, they took mine from me at the lodge,” said 
Mr. Dennis ; “ but mine’s a peculiar case.” 

“ Is it ? They took mine too.” 

“ Why then, I tell you what, brother,” Dennis began 
“You must look up your friends” — 

“ My friends ! ” cried Hugh, starting up and resting 
on his hands. “ Where are my friends ? ” 

“Your relations then,” said Dennis. 

“ Ha, ha, ha ! ” laughed Hugh, waving one arm above 
his head. “ He talks of friends to me — talks of rela- 
tions to a man whose mother died the death in store for 
her son, and left him, a hungry brat, without a face he 
knew in all the world ! He talks of this to me ! ” 

“ Brother,” cried the hangman, whose features under- 
went a sudden change, “you don’t mean to say” — 

“ I mean to say,” Hugh interposed, “ that they hung 
her up at Tyburn. What was good enough for her, is 
good enough for me. Let them do the like by me as 
soon as they please — the sooner the better. Say no 
more to me. I’m going to sleep.” 

“ But I want to speak to you ; I want to hear more 
about that,” said Dennis, changing color. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


217 

“ If you’re a wise man,” growled Hugh, raising his 
head to look at him with a frown, “ you’ll hold your 
tongue. I tell you I’m going to sleep.” 

Dennis venturing to say something more in spite of 
this caution, the desperate fellow struck at him with all 
his force, and missing him, lay down again with many 
muttered oaths and imprecations, and turned his face 
towards the wall. After two or three ineffectual twitches 
at his dress, which he was hardy enough to venture upon, 
notwithstanding his dangerous humor, Mr. Dennis, who 
burnt, for reasons of his own, to pursue the conversation, 
had no alternative but to sit as patiently as he could: 
waiting his further pleasure. 


218 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


CHAPTER LXXV. 

A MONTH has elapsed, — and we stand in the bed- 
chamber of Sir John Chester. Through the half-opened 
window, the Temple Garden looks green and pleasant ; 
the placid liver, gay with boat and barge, and dimpled 
with the plash of many an oar, sparkles in the distance ; 
the sky is blue and clear ; and the summer air steals 
gently in, filling the room with perfume. The very 
town, the smoky town, is radiant. High roofs and 
steeple tops, wont to look black and sullen, smile a 
cheerful gray ; every old gilded vane, and ball, and 
cross, glitters anew in the bright morning sun ; and, 
high among them all, St. Paul’s towers up, showing its 
lofty crest in burnished gold. 

Sir John was breakfasting in bed. His chocolate and 
toast stood upon a little table at his elbow ; books and 
newspapers lay ready to his hand upon the coverlet ; and, 
sometimes pausing to glance with an air of tranquil satis- 
faction round the well-ordered room, and sometimes to 
gaze indolently at the summer sky, he ate, and drank, 
and read the news luxuriously. 

The cheerful influence of the morning seemed to have 
some effect, even upon his equable temper. His manner 
was unusually gay ; his smile more placid and agreeable 
than usual ; his voice more clear and pleasant. He laid 
down the newspaper he had been reading ; leaned back 
upon his pillow with the air of one who resigned himself 


barnaby rudge. 


219 


to a train of charming recollections ; and after a pause, 
soliloquized as follows : — 

“ And ray friend the centaur, goes the way of his 
mama ! I am not surprised. And his mysterious friend 
Mr. Dennis, likewise ! I am not surprised. And my old 
postman, the exceedingly free and easy young madman 
of Chigwell ! I am quite rejoiced. It’s the very best 
thing that could possibly happen to him.” 

After delivering himself of these remarks, he fell again 
into his smiling train of reflection ; from which he roused 
himself at length to finish his chocolate, which was get- 
ting cold, and ring the bell for more. 

The new supply arriving, he took the cup from his 
servant’s hand ; and saying, with a charming affability, 
“ I am obliged to you. Peak,” dismissed him. 

“ It is a remarkable circumstance,” he mused, dallying 
lazily with the teaspoon, “that my friend the madman 
should have been within an ace of escaping, on his trial ; 
and it was a good stroke of chance (or, as the world 
would say, a providential occurrence) that the brother 
of my Lord Mayor should have been in court, with 
other countjy justices, into whose very dense heads 
curiosity had penetrated. For though the brother of 
my Lord Mayor was decidedly wrong ; and established 
his near relationship to that amusing person beyond all 
doubt, in stating that my friend was sane, and had, .to 
his knowledge, wandered about the country with a vaga- 
bond parent, avowing revolutionary and rebellious senti- 
ments ; I am not the less obliged to him for volunteering 
that evidence. These insane creatures make such very 
odd and embarrassing remarks, that they really ought to 
be hanged for the comfort of society.” 

The country justice had indeed turned the wavering 


220 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


scale against poor Baniaby, and solved the doubt that 
trembled in his favor. Grip little thought how much he 
had to answer for. 

“ They will be a singular party,” said Sir John, lean- 
ing his head upon his hand, and sipping his chocolate ; 
“ a very curious party. The hangman himself ; the cen- 
taur ; and the madman. The centaur would make a 
very handsome preparation in Surgeons’ Hall, and would 
benefit science extremely. I hope they have taken care 
to bespeak him. — Peak, I am not at home, of course, to 
anybody but the hair-dresser.” 

This reminder to his servant was called forth by a 
knock at the door, which the man hastened to open. 
After a prolonged murmur of question and answer, he 
returned ; and as he cautiously closed the room-door be- 
hind him, a man was heard to cough in the passage. 

“ Now, it is of no use Peak,” said Sir John, raising 
his hand in deprecation of his delivering any message ; 
“ I am not at home. I cannot possibly hear you. I told 
you I was not at home, and my word is sacred. Will 
you never do as you are desired ? ” 

Having nothing to oppose to this reproof, the man was 
about to withdraw, when the visitor who had given 
occasion to it, probably rendered impatient by delay, 
knocked with his knuckles at the chamber-door, and 
called out that he had urgent business with Sir John 
Chester, which admitted of no delay. 

Let him in,” said Sir John. “ My good fellow,” he 
added, when the door was opened, “ how come you to in- 
trude yourself in this extraordinary manner upon the 
privacy of a gentleman ? How can you be so wholly 
•lestitute of self-respect as to be guilty of such remark- 
able ill-breeding ? ” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


221 


“ My business, Sir John, is not of a common kind, I 
do assure you,” returned the person he addressed. “ If 
I have taken any uncommon course to get admission to 
you, I hope I shall be pardoned on that account.” 

“ Well ! we shall see ; we shall see ; ” returned Sir 
John, whose face cleared up w-hen he saw who it was,' 
and whose prepossessing smile was now restored. “ I 
am sure we have met before,” he added in his winning 
tone, “ but really I forget your name ? ” 

“ My name is Gabriel Varden, sir.” 

“ Varden, of course, Varden,” returned Sir John, tap- 
ping his forehead. “ Dear me, how very defective my 
memory becomes ! Varden to be sure — Mr. Varden 
the locksmith. You have a charming wife, Mr. Varden, 
and a most beautiful daughter. They are well ? ” 
Gabriel thanked him, and said they were. 

“ I rejoice to hear it,” said Sir John. “ Commend me 
to them when you return, and say that I wished I were 
fortunate enough to convey, myself, the salute which I 
intrust you to deliver. And what,” he asked very 
sweetly, after a moment’s pause, “ can I do for you * 
You may command me, freely.” 

“I thank you. Sir John,” said Gabriel, with sonr> 
pride in his manner, “ but I have come to ask no fa- 
vor of you, though I come on business. — Private,” he 
added, with a glance at the man, who stood looking on, 
“ and very pressing business.” ‘ 

“ I cannot say you are the more welcome for being 
independent, and having nothing to ask of me,” returned 
Sir John, graciously, “ for I should have been happy to 
render you a service ; still, you are welcome on any 
^rms. Oblige me with some more chocolate, Peak, 
and don’t wait.” 


/ 


222 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


The man retired, and left them alone. 

“ Sir John,” said Gabriel, “ I am a working-man, and 
have been so, all my life. If I don’t prepare you enough 
for what I have to tell ; if I come to the point too ab- 
ruptly; and give you a shock, which a gentleman could 
have spared you, or at all events lessened very much ; 1 
hope you will give me credit for meaning well. I wish 
to be careful and considerate, and I trust that in a 
straightforward person like me, you’ll take the will for 
the deed.” 

“ Mr. Varden,” returned the other, perfectly composed 
under this exordium ; “ I beg you’ll take a chair. Choc- 
olate, perhaps, you don’t relish ? Well ! it is an acquired 
taste, no doubt.” 

“ Sir John,” said Gabriel, who had acknowledged with 
a bow the invitation to be seated, but had not availed 
himself of it: “Sir John” — he dropped his voice and 
drew nearer to the bed — “lam just now come from 
Newgate ” — 

“ Good Gad ! ” cried Sir John, hastily sitting up in 
bed ; “ from Newgate, Mr. Varden ! How could you be 
so very imprudent as to come from Newgate ! Newgate, 
where there are jail-fevers, and ragged people, and bare- 
footed men and women, and a thousand horrors ! Peak, 
bring the camphor, quick ! Heaven and earth, Mr. Var- 
den, my dear, good soul, how could you come from New- 
gate ? ” 

Gabriel returned no answer, but looked on in silence 
while Peak (who had entered opportunely with the hot 
chocolate) ran to a drawer, and returning with a boltle, 
sprinkled his master’s dressing-gown and the bedding ; 
and besides moistening the locksmith himself, plentifully, 
described a circle round about him on the carpet. When 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


228 


he had done this, he again retired ; and Sir John, reclin- 
ing in an easy attitude upon his pillow, once more turned 
a smiling face towards his visitor. 

“ You will forgive me, Mr. Varden, I am sure, for 
being at first a little sensitive both on your account and 
my own. I confess I was startled, notwithstanding your 
delicate exordium. Might I ask you to do me the favor 
not to approach any nearer ? — You have really come 
from Newgate ! ” 

The locksmith inclined his head. 

“ In-deed ! And now, Mr. Varden, all exaggeration 
and embellishment apart,” said Sir John Chester, confi- 
dentially, as he sipped his chocolate, “ what kind of 
place is Newgate ? ” 

“ A strange place. Sir John,” returned the locksmith, 
‘‘ of a sad and doleful kind. A strange place, where 
many strange things are heard and seen ; but few more 
strange than that I come to tell you of. The case is 
urgent. I am sent here.” 

“ Not — no, no — not from the jail ? ” • 

“Yes, Sir John ; from the jail.” 

“ And my good, credulous, open-hearted friend,” said 
Sir John, setting down his cup, and laughing, — “by 
whom ? ” 

“ By a man called Dennis — for many years the hang'- 
man, and to-morrow morning the hanged,” returned the 
locksmith. 

Sir John had expected — had been quite certain from 
the first — that he would say he had come from Hugh, 
and was prepared to meet him on that point. But 
this answer occasioned him a degree of astonishment, 
which, for the moment, he could not, with all his com- 
<Dand of feature, prevent his face from expressing. He 


224 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


quickly subdued it, however, and said in the same light 
tone : 

“ And what does the gentleman require of me ? My 
memory may be at fault again, but I don’t recollect that 
I ever had the pleasure of an introduction to him, or 
that I ever numbered him among my personal friends, I 
do assure you, Mr. Varden.” 

“ Sir John,” returned the locksmith, gravely, “ I 
will tell you, as nearly as I can, in the words he used 
to me, what he desires that you should know, and 
what you ought to know without a moment’s loss of 
time.” 

Sir John Chester settled himself in » a position of 
greater repose, and looked at his visitor with an expres- 
sion of face which seemed to say, “ This is an amusing 
fellow ! I’ll hear him out.” 

“ You may have seen in the newspapers, sir,” said 
Gabriel, pointing to the one which lay by his side, “ that 
I was a witness against this man upon his trial some 
days since ; and that it was not his fault I was alive, and 
able to speak to what I knew.” 

• “ May have seen ! ” cried Sir John. “ My dear Mr. 
Varden, you are quite a public character, and live in all 
men’s thoughts most deservedly. Nothing can exceed 
the interest with which I read your testimony, and re- 
membered that I had the pleasure of a slight acquaint- 
ance with you. — I hope we shall have your portrait 
published ? ” 

“This morning, sir,” said the locksmith, taking no 
notice of these compliments, “ early this morning, a mes- 
sage was brought to me from Newgate, at this man’s 
•equest, desiring that I would go and see him, for he had 
something particular to communicate. I needn’t tell you 


I 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


225 


that he is no friend of mine, and that I had never seen 
him, until the rioters beset my house.” 

Sir John fanned himself gently with the newspaper, 
and nodded. 

“ I knew, however, from the general report,” resumed 
Gabriel, “ that the order for his execution to-morrow, 
went down to the prison last night ; and looking upon 
him as a dying man, I complied with his request.” 

“ You are quite a Christian, Mr. Varden,” said Sir 
John ; “ and in that amiable capacity, you increase my 
desire that you should take a chair.” 

“ He said,” continued Gabriel, looking steadily at the 
knight, “ that he had sent to me, because he had no 
friend or companion in the whole world (being the com- 
mon hangman), and because he believed, from the way 
in which I had given my evidence, that I was an honest 
man, and would act truly by him. He said that, being 
shunned by every one who knew his calling, even by 
people of the lowest and most wretched grade, and find- 
ing, when he joined the rioters, that the men he acted 
with had no suspicion of it (which I believe is true 
enough, for a poor fool of an old ’prentice of mine was 
one of them) he had kept his own counsel, up to the 
time of his being taken and put in jail.” 

“ Very discreet of Mr. Dennis,” observed Sir John 
with a slight yawn, though still with the utmost affa- 
bility, “ but — except for your admirable and lucid 
manner of telling it, which is perfect — not very inter- 
esting to me.” 

“ When,” pursued the locksmith, quite unabashed and 
wholly regardless of these interruptions, “ when he was 
token to the jail, he found that his fellow- prisoner, in the 
same room, was a young man, Hugh by name, a leader 

VOL. III. 15 


226 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


in the riots, who had been betrayed and given up by 
himself. From something which fell from this unhappy 
creature in the course of the angry words they had at 
meeting, he discovered that his mother had suffered the 
death to which they both are now condemned. — The 
time is very short, Sir John.” 

The knight laid down his paper fan, replaced his cup 
upon the table at his side, and, saving for the smile that 
lurked about his mouth, looked at the locksmith with as 
much steadiness as the locksmith looked at him. 

“ They have been in prison now, a month. One con- 
versation led to many more; and the hangman soon 
found, from a comparison of time, and place, and dates, 
that he had executed the sentence of the law upon this 
woman, himself. She had been tempted by want — as 
so many people are — into the easy crime of passing 
forged notes. She was young and handsome ; and the 
traders who employ men, women, and children in this 
traffic, looked upon her as one who was well adapted for 
their business, and who would probably go on without 
suspicion for a long time. But they were mistaken ; for 
she was stopped in the commission of her very first 
offence, and died for it. She was of gypsy blood, Sir 
John ” — 

It might have been the effect of a passing cloud which 
obscured the sun, and cast a shadow on his face ; but the 
knight turned deadly pale. Still he met the locksmith’s 
eye, as before. 

“ She was of gypsy blood. Sir John,” repeated Gabriel, 
“ and had a high, free spirit. This, and her good looks, 
and her lofty manner, interested some gentlemen who 
were easily moved by dark eyes ; and efforts were made 
to save her. They might have been successful, if she 


BARNABr RUDGE. 


227 


would have given them any clew to her history. But 
she never would, or did. There was reason to suspect 
that she would make an attempt upon her life. A watch 
was set upon her night and day ; and from that time she 
never spoke again ” — 

Sir John stretched out his hand towards his cup. The 
locksmith going on, arrested it half-way. 

— “ Until she had but a minute to live. Then she 
broke silence, and said, in a low firm voice which no one 
heard but this executioner, for all other living creatures 
had retired and left her to her fate, ‘ If I had a dagger 
within these fingers and he was within my reach, I 
would strike him dead before me, even now ! * The 
man asked ‘ Who ? ’ She said. The father of her 
boy.” 

Sir John drew back his outstretched hand, and seeing 
that the locksmith paused, signed to him with easy po- 
liteness* and without any new appearance of emotion, to 
proceed. 

“It was the first word she had ever spoken, from 
which it could be understood that she had- any relative 
on earth. ‘ Was the child alive ? ’ he asked. ‘ Yes.* 
He asked her where it was, its name, and whether she 
had any wish respecting it. She had but one, she said. 
It was that the boy might live and grow, in utter igno- 
rance of his father, so that no arts might teach him to 
be gentle and forgiving. When he became a man, she 
trusted to the God of their tribe to bring the father and 
the son together, and revenge her through her child. 
He asked her other questions, but she spoke no more. 
Indeed, he says she scarcely said this much, to him, but 
stood with her face turned upwards to the sky, and 
uever looked towards him once.” 


228 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Sir John took a pinch of snuff ; glanced approvingly 
at an elegant little sketch, entitled “ Nature,” on the 
wall ; and raising his eyes to the locksmith^s face again, 
said, with an air of courtesy and patronage, “ You were 
observing, Mr. Varden ” — 

“ That she never,” returned the locksmith, who was 
not to be diverted by any artifice from his firm manner, 
and his steady gaze, “ that she never looked towards 
him once, Sir John ; and so she died, and he forgot her. 
But, some years afterwards a man was sentenced to 
die the same death, who was a gypsy too ; a sunburnt, 
swarthy fellow, almost a wild man ; and while he lay in 
prison, under sentence, he, who had seen the hangman 
more than once while he was free, cut an image of him 
on his stick, by way of braving death, and showing those 
who attended on him, how little he cared or thought 
about it. He gave this stick into his hands at Tyburn, 
and told him then, that the woman I have spoken of had 
left her own people to join a fine gentleman, and that, 
being deserted by him, and cast off by her old friends, 
she had sworn within her own proud breast, that what- 
ever her misery might be, she would ask no help of any 
human being. He told him that she had kept her word 
to the last ; and that, meeting even him in the streets — 
he had been fond of her once, it seems — she had slipped 
from him by a trick, and he never saw her again, until, 
being in one of the frequent crowds at Tyburn, with 
some of his rough companions, he had been driven al- 
most mad by seeing, in the criminal under another name, 
whose death he had come to witness, herself. Standing 
in the same place in which she had stood, he told the 
hangman this, and told him, too, her real name, which 
only her own people and the gentleman for whose sake 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


229 


she had left them, knew. — That name he will tell again, 
Sir John, to none but you.” 

“ To none but me ! ” exclaimed the knight, pausing in 
the act of raising his cup to his lips with a perfectly 
steady hand, and curling up his little finger for the bet- 
ter display of a brilliant ring with which it was orna- 
mented : but me ! — My dear Mr. Varden, how very 
preposterous, to select me for his confidence ! With you 
at his elbow, too, who are so perfectly trustworthy ! ” 

^ Sir John, Sir John,” returned the locksmith, “ at 
twelve to-morrow, these nien die. Hear the few words 
I have to add, and do not hope to deceive me ; for 
though I am a plain man of humble station, and you 
are a gentleman of rank and learning, the truth raises 
me to your level, and I know that you anticipate the 
disclosure with which I am about to end, and that you 
believe this doomed man, Hugh, to be your son.” 

“ Nay,” said Sir John, bantering him with a gay air ; 
“ the wild gentleman, who died so suddenly, scarcely went 
as far as that, I think ? ” 

“ He did not,” returned the locksmith, “ for she had 
bound him by some pledge, known only to these people, 
and which the worst among them respect, not to tell 
your name : but, in a fantastic pattern on the stick, he 
had carved some letters, and when the hangman asked 
it, he bade him, especially if he should ever meet with 
her son in after life, remember that place well.” 

“ What place ? ” 
t; “ Chester.” 

The knight finished his cup of chocolate with an ap- 
pearance of infinite relish, and carefully wiped his lips 
upon his handkerchief. 

“ Sir John,” said the locksmith, “ this is all that has 


230 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


been told to me; but since these two men have been 
left for death, they have conferred together, closely. 
See them, and hear what they can add. See this Den- 
nis, and learn from him what he^has not trusted to me. 
If yoU; who hold the clew to all, want corroboration 
(w'hich you do not), the means are easy.” 

“ And to what,” said Sir John Chester, rising on his 
elbow, after smoothing the pillow for its reception ; “ my 
dear, good-natured, estimable Mr. Varden — with whom 
I cannot be angry if I would — to what does all this 
tend?” 

“T take you for a man. Sir John, and I suppose it 
tends to some pleading of natural affection in your 
breast,” returned the locksmith. “ I suppose to the strain- 
ing of every nerve and the exertion of all the influence 
you have, or can make, in behalf of your miserable son, 
and the man who has disclosed his existence to you. At 
the worst, I suppose to your seeing your son, and awak- 
ening him to a sense of his crime and danger. He has 
no such sense now. Think what his life must have 
been, when he said in my hearing, that if I moved you 
to anything, it would be to hastening his death, and en- 
suring his silence, if you had it in your power ! ” 

“ And have you, my good Mr. Varden,” said Sir John 
in a tone of mild reproof, “ have you really lived to 
your present age, and remained so very simple and 
credulous, as to approach a gentleman of established 
character with such credentials as these, from desperate 
men in their last extremity, catching at any straw ? Oh 
dear ! Oh fie, fie ! ” 

The locksmith was going to interpose, but he stopped 
him : — 

“ On any other subject, Mr. Varden, I shall be de- 


BARNABY RITDGE. 


231 


lighted — 1 shall be charmed — to converse with you, 
but I owe it to my own character not to pursue this 
topic for another moment.” 

“ Think better of it, sir. when I am gone,” returned 
the locksmith ; “ think better of it, sir. Although you 
have, thrice w'ithin as many weeks, turned your lawful 
son, Mr. Edward, from your door, you may have time, 
you may have years to make your peace with him, Sir 
John : but that twelve o’clock will soon be here, and 
soon be past forever.” 

‘‘ I thank you very much,” returned the knight, kiss- 
ing his delicate hand to the locksmith, “ for your guile- 
less advice ; and I only wish, my good soulj although 
your simplicity is quite captivating, that you had a little 
more w'orldly wisdom. I never so much regretted the 
arrival of my hair-dresser as I do at this moment. God 
bless you ! Good-morning ! You’ll not forget my mes- 
sage to the ladies, Mr. Varden? Peak, show Mr. Var- 
den to the door.” 

Gabriel said no more, but gave the knight a parting 
look, and left him. As he quitted the room. Sir John’s 
face changed ; and the smile gave place to a haggard 
and anxious expression, like that of a weary actor jaded 
by the performance of a difficult part. He rose from 
his bed with a heavy sigh, and wrapped himself in his 
morning-gown. 

“ So, she kept her word,” he said, “ and was constant 
to her threat ! I would I had never seen that dark face 
of hers, — I might have read these consequences in it, 
from the first. This affair would make a noise abroad, 
if it rested on better evidence ; but, as it is, and by not 
joining the scattered links of the chain, I can afford to 
slight it. — Extremely distressing to be the parent of 


232 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Buch an uncouth creature ! Still, I gave him very good 
advice. I told him he would certainly be hanged. I 
could have done no more if I had known of our rela- 
tionship ; and there are a great many fathers w'ho have 
never done as much for their natural children. — The 
hair-dresser may come in, Peak ! ” 

The hair-dresser came in ; and saw' in Sir John Ches- 
ter (whose accommodating conscience was soon quieted 
by the numerous precedents that occurred to him in sup- 
port of his last observation), the same imperturbable, 
fascinating, elegant gentleman he had seen yesterday, 
and many yesterdays before. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


233 


CHAPTER LXXVL 

As the locksmith walked slowly away from Sir John 
Chester’s chambers, he lingered under the trees which 
shaded the path, almost hoping that he might be sum- 
moned to return. He had turned back thrice, and still 
loitered at the corner, when the clock struck twelve. 

It was a solemn sound, and not merely for its refer- 
ence to to-morrow ; for he knew that in that chime 
the murderer’s knell was rung. He had seen him pass 
along the crowded street, amidst the execrations of the 
throng ; had marked his quivering lip, and trembling 
limbs ; the ashy hue upon his face, his clammy brow, 
the wild distraction of his eye, — the fear of death that 
swallowed up all other thoughts, and gnawed without ces- 
sation at his heart and brain. He had marked the wan- 
dering look, seeking for hope, and finding, turn where 
it w^ould, despair. He had seen the remorseful, piti- 
ful, desolate creature, riding, with his coffin by his side, 
to the gibbet. He knew that, to the last, he had been 
an unyielding, obdurate man ; that in the savage terror 
of his condition he had hardened, rather than relented, 
to his wife and child ; and that the last words which 
had passed his white lips were curses on them as his 
enemies. 

Mr. Haredale had determined to be there and see it 
done. Nothing but the evidence of his own senses 
could satisfy that gloomy thirst for retribution which had 


234 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


been gathering upon him for so many years. The lock- 
smith knew this, and when the chimes had ceased to 
vibrate, hurried away to meet him. 

For these two men,” he said, as he went, “ I can do 
no more. Heaven have mercy on them ! — Alas ! I say 
I can do no more for them, but whom can I help ? Mary 
Rudge will have a home, and a firm friend when she 
most wants one ; but Bamaby — poor Barnaby — will- 
ing Barnaby — what aid can I render him ? There are 
many, many men of sense, God forgive me,” cried the 
honest locksmith, stopping in a narrow court to pass 
his hand across his eyes, “ I could better afford to lose 
than Barnaby. We have always been good friends, 
but I never knew, till now, how much I loved the 
lad.” 

There were not many in the great city who thought 
of Barnaby that day, otherwise than as an actor in a 
show which was to take place to-morrow. But, if the 
whole population liad had him in their minds, and had 
wished his life to be spared, not one among them could 
have done so with a purer zeal or greater singleness of 
heart than the good locksmith. 

Barnaby was to die. There was no hope. It is not 
the least evil attendant upon the frequent exhibition of 
this last dread punishment, of Death, that it hardens the 
minds of those who deal it out, and makes them, though 
they be amiable men in other respects, indifferent to, or 
unconscious of, their great responsibility. The word had 
gone forth that Barnaby was to die. It went forth, every 
month, for lighter crimes. It was a thing so common, 
that very few were startled by the awful sentence, or 
cared to question its propriety. Just then, too, when the 
law had been so flagrantly outraged, its dignity must be 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


235 


asserted. The symbol of its dignity, — stamped upon 
every page of the criminal statute-book, — was the gill- 
lows ; and Barnaby was to die. 

They had tried to save him. The locksmith had car- 
ried petitions and memorials to the fountain-head, with 
his own hands. But the well was not one of mercy, anf 
Barnaby was to die. 

From the first, his mother had never left him, save at 
night ; and witli her beside him, he was as usual con- 
tented. On this last day, he was more elated and more 
proud than he had been yet; and when she dropped 
the book she had been reading to him aloud, and fell 
upon his neck, he stopped in his busy task of fold- 
ing a piece of crape about his hat, and wondered at 
her anguish. Grip uttered a feeble croak, half in en- 
couragement, it seemed, and half in remonstrance, but 
he wanted heart to sustain it, and lapsed abruptly into 
silence. 

With them, who stood upon the brink of the great 
gulph which none can see beyond. Time, so soon to lose 
itself in vast Eternity, rolled on like a mighty river, 
swoln and rapid as it nears the sea. It was morning 
but now ; they had sat and talked together in a dream ; 
and here was evening. The dreadful hour of separa- 
tion, which even yesterday had seemed so distant, was 
at hand. 

They walked out into the court-yard, clinging to each 
other, but not speaking. Barnaby knew that the jail 
was a dull, sad, miserable place, and looked forward to 
to-morrow, as to a passage from it to something bright 
and beautiful. He had a vague impression too, that he 
was expected to be brave — that he was a man of great 
consequence, and that the prison people would be glad to 


236 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


make him weep. He trod the ground more firmly as he 
thought of this, and bade her take heart and cry no more, 
and feel how steady his hand was. “ They call me silly, 
mother. They shall see — to-morrow ! ” 

Dennis and Hugh were in the court-yard. Hugh 
came forth from his cell as they did, stretching himself' 
as though he had been sleeping. Dennis sat upon a 
bench in a corner, with his knees and chin huddled to- 
gether, and rocked himself to and fro like a person in 
severe pain. 

The mother and son remained on one side of the court, 
and these two men upon the other. Hugh strode up and 
down, glancing fiercely every now and then at the bright 
summer-sky, and looking round, when he had done so, at 
the walls. 

“ No reprieve, no reprieve ! Nobody comes near us. 
There’s only the night left now ! ” moaned Dennis faintly, 
as he wrung his hands. “ Do you think they’ll reprieve 
me in the night, brother ? I’ve known reprieves come 
in the night, afore now. I’ve known ’em come as late 
as five, six, and seven o’clock in the morning. Don’t 
you think there’s a good chance yet, — don’t you ? Say 
you do. Say you do, young man,” whined the miserable 
creature, with an imploring gesture towards Barnaby, 
“ or I shall go mad ! ” 

“ Better be mad than sane, here,” said Hugh. “ Go 
mad.” 

“ But tell me what you think. Somebody tell rno 
what he thinks ! ” cried the wretched object, — so mean, 
and wretched, and despicable, that even Pity’s self might 
have turned away, at sight of such a being in the likeness 
of a man — “ isn’t there a chance for me, — isn’t there 
« good chance for me ? Isn’t it likely they may be doing 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


237 


this to frighten me ? Don’t you think it is ? Oh ! ” he 
almost shrieked, as he wrung his hands, “ won’t anybody 
give me comfort ! ” 

“ You ought to be the best, instead of the worst,” said 
Hugh, stopping before him. “ Ha, ha, ha ! See the 
hangman, when it comes home to him ! ” 

“ You don’t know what it is,” cried Dennis, actually 
writhing as he spoke. “ I do. That I should come to 
be worked off ! I ! I ! That 1 should come ! ” 

“ And why not ? ” said Hugh, as he thrust back his 
matted hair to get a better view of his late associate. 
“ How often, before I knew your trade, did I hear you 
talking of this as if it was a treat ? ” 

“I a’n’t unconsistent,” screamed the miserable crea- 
ture ; “ I’d talk so again, if I was hangman. Some 
other man has got ray old opinions at this minute. That 
makes it worse. Somebody’s longing to work me off. I 
know by myself that somebody must be ! ” 

“ He’ll soon have his longing,” said Hugh, resuming 
his walk. “Think of that, and be, quiet.” 

Although one of these men displayed, in his speech 
and bearing, the most reckless hardihood ; and the other, 
in his every word and action, testified such an extreme 
of abject cowardice that it was humiliating to see him ; 
it would be difficult to say which of them would most 
have repelled and shocked an observer. Hugh’s was 
the dogged desperation of a savage at the stake; the 
hangman was reduced to a condition little better, if 
any, than that of a hound with the halter round his 
neck. Yet, as Mr. Dennis knew and could have told 
them, these were the two commonest states of mind 
*n psrsons brought to their pass. Such was the whole- 
sale growth of the s'^ed sown by the law, that this 


238 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


kind of harvest was usually looked for, as a matter of 
course. , 

In one respect they all agreed. The wandering and 
uncontrollable train of thought, suggesting sudden recol- 
lections of things distant and long forgotten and remote 
from each other — the vague restless craving for some- 
thing undefined, which nothing could satisfy — the swift 
flight of the minutes, fusing themselves into hours, as if 
by enchantment — the rapid coming of the solemn night 
— the shadow of death always upon them, and yet so 
dim and faint, that objects the meanest and most trivial 
started from the gloom beyond, and forced themselves 
upon the view — the impossibility of holding the mind, 
even if they had been so disposed, to penitence and 
preparation, or of keeping it to any point while one 
hideous fascination tempted it away — these things were 
common to them all, and varied only in their outward 
tokens. 

“ Fetch me the book I left within — upon your bed,” 
she said to Barnaby, as the clock struck. “ Kiss me 
flrst!” 

He looked in her face, and saw there that the time 
was come. After a long embrace, he tore himself away, 
and ran to bring it to her ; bidding her not stir till he 
came back. He soon returned, for a shriek recalled 
him, — but she was gone. 

He ran to the yard-gate, and looked through. They 
were carrying her away. She had said her heart would 
break. It was better so. 

“ Don’t you think,” whimpered Dennis, creeping up to 
him, as he stood with his feet rooted to the ground, gaz- 
flig at the blank walls — “ don’t you think there’s still a 
ehance ? It’s a dreadful end ; it’s a terrible end for a 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


289 


man like me. Don’t you think there’s a chance ? I don’t 
mean for you, I mean for me. Don’t let him hear us ” 
(meaning Hugh) ; “ he’s so desperate.” 

“ Now then,” said the officer, who had been lounging 
in and out with his hands in his pockets, and yawning as 
if he were in the last extremity for some subject of iriM 
lerest: “it’s time to turn in, boys.” 

“ Not yet,” cried Dennis, “ not yet. Not for an hour 
yet.” 

“ I say, — your watch goes different from what it used 
to,” returned the man. “ Once upon a time it was al- 
ways too fast. It’s got the other fault now.” 

“ My friend,” cried the wretched creature, falling on 
his knees, “ my dear friend — you always were my dear 
friend — there’s some mistake. Some letter has been 
mislaid, or some messenger has been stopped upon the 
way. He may have fallen dead. I saw a man once, 
fall down dead in the street, myself, and he had papers 
in his pocket. Send to inquire. Let somebody go to 
inquire. They never will hang me. They never can. 
— Yes, they will,” he cried, starting to his feet with a 
terrible scream. “ They’ll hang me by a trick, and keep 
the pardon back. It’s a plot against me. I shall lose 
my life ! ” And uttering another yell, he fell in a fit 
upon the ground. 

“ See the hangman when it comes home to him I ” 
cried Hugh again, as they bore him away “ Ha, ha, 
la ! Courage, bold Barnaby, what care we ? Your 
Hand ! They do well to put us out of the world, for if 
we got loose a second time, we wouldn’t let them off so 
»asy, eh ? Another shake ! A man can die but once. 
If you wake in the night, sing that out lustily, and fall 
asleep again. Ha, ha, ha ! ” 


240 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Barnaby glanced once more through the grate into 
the empty yard ; and then watched Hugh as he strode 
to the steps leading to his sleeping-cell. He heard him 
shout, and burst into a roar of laughter, and saw him 
flourish his hat. Then he turned away himself, like one 
who walked in his sleep ; and, without any sense of fear 
or sorrow, lay down on his pallet, listening for the clock 
to strike again. 






:i i>. , i J: 


( 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


211 


CHAPTER LXXVIL 

The time wore on. The noises in the streets became 
less frequent bj degrees, until silence was scarcely 
broken save by the bells in church-towers, marking the 
progress — softer and more stealthy while the city slum- 
bered — of that Great Watcher with the hoary head, 
who never sleeps or rests. In the brief interval of dark- 
ness and repose which feverish towns enjoy, all busy 
sounds were hushed ; and those who awoke from dreams 
lay listening in their beds, and longed for dawn, and 
wished the dead of the night were past. 

Into the street outside the jail’s main wall, workmen 
came straggling at this solemn hour, in groups of two or 
three, and meeting in the centre cast their tools upon the 
ground and spoke in whispers. Others soon issued from 
the jail itself, bearing on their shoulders planks and 
beams ; these materials being all brought forth, the rest 
bestirred themselves, and the dull sound of hammers 
be^an to echo through the stillness. 

Here and there among this knot of laborers, one, with 
a lantern or a smoky link, stood by to light his fellows 
at their work ; and by its doubtful aid, some might be 
dimly seen taking, up the pavement of the road, while 
others held great upright posts, or fixed them in the 
holes thus made for their reception. Some dragged 
slowly on towards the rest, an empt}^ cart, which they 
brought rumbling from the prison-yard ; while others 

VOL TII 16 


242 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


erected strong barriers across the street. All were busily 
engaged. Their dusky figures moving to and fro, at 
that unusual hour, so active and so silent, might have 
been taken for those of shadowy creatures toiling at mid- 
night on some ghostly unsubstantial work, which, like 
themselves, would vanish with the first gleam of day, 
and leave but morning mist and vapor. 

While it was yet dark, a few lookers-on collected, who 
Lad plainly come there for the purpose and intended to 
remain : even those who had to pass the spot on their 
way to some other place, lingered, and lingered yet, as 
though the attraction of that were irresistible. Mean- 
while the noise of saw and mallet went on briskly, min- 
gled with the clattering of boards on the stone pavement 
of the road, and sometimes with the workmen’s voices as 
they called to one another. Whenever the chimes of 
the neighboring church were heard — and that was 
every quarter of an hour — a strange sensation, instan- 
taneous and indescribable, but perfectly obvious, seemed 
to pervade them all. 

Gradually, a faint brightness appeared in the east, and 
the air, which had been very warm all through the night, 
felt cool and chilly. Though there was no daylight yet, 
the darkness was diminished, and the stars looked pale. 
The prison, which had been a mere black mass with 
little shape or form, put on its usual aspect ; and ever 
and anon a solitary watchman could be seen upon its 
roof, stopping to look down upon the preparations in the 
street. This man, from forming, as it were, a part of 
the jail, and knowing, or being supposed to know, all 
that was passing within, became an object of as much 
interest, and was as eagerly looked for, and as awfully 
pointed out, as if he had been a spirit. 


BARNABY KUDGE. 


243 


By and by, the feeble light grew stronger, and the 
houses with their sign-boards and inscriptions stood 
plainly out, in the dull gray morning. Heavy stage- 
wagons crawled from the inn-yard opposite ; and trav- 
ellers peeped out ; and as they rolled sluggishly away, 
cast many a backward look towards the jail. And now, 
the sun’s first beams came glancing into the street ; and 
the night’s work, which, in its various stages and in the 
varied fancies of the lookers-on had taken a hundred 
shapes, wore its own proper form — a scaffold, and a 
gibbet. 

As the warmth of cheerful day began to shed itself 
upon the scanty crowd, the murmur of tongues was heard, 
shutters were thrown open, and blinds drawn up, and 
those who had slept in rooms over against the prison, 
where places to see the execution were let at high prices, 
rose hastily from their beds. In some of the houses, 
people were busy taking out the window sashes for the 
better accommodation of spectators ; in others, the spec- 
tators were already seated, and beguiling the time with 
cards, or drink, or jokes among themselves. Some had 
purchased seats upon the house-tops, and were already 
crawling to their stations from parapet and garret-win- 
dow. Some were yet bargaining for good places, and 
stood in them in a state of indecision : gazing at the 
slowly-swelling crowd, and at the workmen as they 
rested listlessly against the scaffold — affecting to listen 
with indifference to the proprietor’s eulogy of the com- 
manding view his house afforded, and the surpassing 
cheapness of his terms. 

A fairer morning never shone. From the roofs and 
upper stories of these buildings, the spires of city 
churches and the great cathedral dome were visible, ris- 


244 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Ing up beyond the prison, into the blue sky, and clad 
in the color of light summer clouds, and showing in the 
clear atmosphere their every scrap of tracery and fret- 
work, and every niche and loop-hole. All was brightness 
and promise, excepting in the street below, into which 
(for it yet lay in shadow) the eye looked dowti as into 
a dark trench, where, in the midst of so much life, and 
hope, and renewal of existence, stood the terrible in- 
strument of death. It seemed as if the very sun for- 
bore to look upon it. 

But it was better, grim and sombre in the shade, than 
when, the day being more advanced, it stood confessed 
in the full glare and glory of the sun, with its black 
paint blistering, and its nooses dangling in the light like 
loathsome garlands. It was better in the solitude and 
gloom of midnight with a few forms clustering about it, 
than in the freshness and the stir of morning : the centre 
of an eager crowd. It was better haunting the street 
like a spectre, when men were in their beds, and influen- 
cing perchance the city’s dreams, than braving the broad 
day, and thrusting its obscene presence upon their wak- 
ing senses. 

Five o’clock had struck — six — seven — and eight. 
Along the two main streets at either end of the cross- 
way, a living stream had now set in, rolling towards the 
marts of gain and business. Carts, coaches, wagons, 
trucks, and barrows, forced a passage through the out- 
skirts of the throng, and clattered onward in the same 
direction. Some of these which w^ere public convey- 
ances and had come from a short distance in the country, 
stopped ; and the driver pointed to the gibbet with his 
whip, though he might have spared himself the pains, 
for the heads of all the passengers were turned that way 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


246 


without his help, and the coach- windows were stuck full 
of staring eyes. In some of the carts and wagons, 
women might be seen, glancing fearfully at the same 
unsightly thing ; and even little children were held up 
above the people’s heads to see what kind of toy a 
gallows was, and learn how men Avere hanged. 

Two rioters were to die before the prison, who had 
been concerned in the attack upon it ; and one directly 
afterwards in Bloomsbury Square. At nine o’clock a 
strong body of military marched into the street, and 
formed and lined a narrow passage into Holborn, which 
had been indifferently kept all night by constables. 
Through this, another cart was brought (the one already 
mentioned had been employed in the construction of 
the scaffold), and wheeled up to the prison-gate. These 
pre paragons made, the soldiers stood at ease ; the 
officers lounged to and fro, in the alley they had made, 
or talked together at the scaffold’s foot; and the con- 
course, which had been rapidly augmenting for some 
hours, and still received additions every minute, Avaited 
with an impatience which increased with every chime 
of St. Sepulchre’s clock, for twelve at noon. 

Up to this time they had been very quiet, compara- 
tively silent, save when the arrival of some new party 
at a windoAV, hitherto unoccupied, gave them something 
new to look at or to talk of. But, as the hour ap- 
proached, a buzz and hum arose, which, deepening every 
moment, soon swelled into a roar, and seemed to fill the 
air. No Avords or even voices could be distinguished 
in this clamor, nor did they speak much to each other ; 
though such as were better informed upon the topic than 
^e rest, would tell their neighbors, perhaps, that they 
might know the hangman when he came out, by his 


246 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


being the shorter one : and that the man who was to 
Buflfer with him was named Hugh : and that it was 
Barnaby Rudge who would be hanged in Bloomsbury 
Square. 

The hum grew, as the time drew near, so loud, that 
those who were at the windows could not hear the 
church-clock strike, though it was close at hand. Nor 
had they any need to hear it, either, for they could see 
it in the people’s faces. So surely as another quarter 
chimed, there was a movement in the crowd — as if 
something had passed over it — as if the light upon 
them had been changed — in which the fact was read- 
able as on a brazen dial, figured by a giant’s hand. 

Three quarters past eleven ! The murmur now was 
deafening, yet every man seemed mute. Look where 
you would among the crowd, you saw strained eyes and 
lips compressed ; it would have been difficult for the 
most vigilant observer to point this way or that, and 
say that yonder man had cried out. It were as easy 
to detect the motion of lips in a sea-shell. 

Three quarters past eleven ! ' Many spectators who 
had retired from the windows, came back refreshed, as 
though their watch had just begun. Those who had 
fallen asleep, roused themselves ; and every person in 
the crowd made one last effort to better his position — - 
which caused a press against the sturdy barriers that 
made them bend and yield like twigs. The officers, 
who until now had kept together, fell into their several 
positions, and gave the words of command. Swords 
were drawn, muskets shouldered, and the bright steel 
winding its way among the crowd, gleamed and glit- 
tered in the sun like a river. Along this shining patl^ 
two men came hurrying on, leading a horse, which was 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


247 


speedily harnessed to the cart at the prison-door. Then, 
a profound silence replaced the tumult that had so long 
been gathering, and a breathless pause ensued. Every 
window was now choked up with heads ; the house-tops 
teemed with people — clinging to chimneys, peering over 
gable-ends, and holding on where the sudden loosening 
of any brick or stone would dash them down into the 
street. The church tower, the church roof, the church- 
yard, the prison leads, the very water-spouts and lamp- 
posts — every inch of room — swarmed with human 
life. 

At the first stroke of twelve the prison bell began 
to toll. Then the roar — mingled now with cries of 
“Hats off!” and “Poor fellows!” and, from some 
specks in the great concourse, with a shriek or groan 

— burst forth again. It was terrible to see — if any 
one in that distraction of excitement could have seen 

— the world of eager eyes, all strained upon the scaf- 
fold and the beam. 

The hollow murmuring was heard within the jail as 
plainly as without. The three were brought forth into 
the yard, together, as it resounded through the air. 
They knew its import well. 

“ D’ye hear ? ” cried Hugh, undaunted by the sound. 
“ They expect us ! I heard them gathering when I 
woke in the night, and turned over on t’other side 
and fell asleep again. We shall see how they welcome 
the hangman, now that it comes home to him. Ha, 
ha, ha ! ” 

The Ordinary coming up at this moment, reproved 
him for his indecent mirth, and advised him to alter 
his demeanor. 

“ And why, master ? ” said Hugh. “ Can I do bet- 


248 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


ter than bear it easily? You bear it easily enough 
Oh ! never tell me,” he cried, as the other would have 
spoken, “ for all your sad look and your solemn air, you 
think little enough of it! They say you’re the best 
maker of lobster salads in London. Ha, ha ! I’ve 
heard that, you see, before now. Is it a good one, 
this morning — is your hand in ? How does the break- 
fast look ? I hope there’s enough, and to spare, for all 
this hungry company that’ll sit down to it, when the 
sight’s over.” 

“ I fear,” observed the clergyman, shaking his head, 
“ that you are incorrigible.” 

“ You’re right. I am,” rejoined Hugh sternly. “ Be 
no hypocrite, master! You make a merry-making of 
this, every month ; let me be merry, too. If you want 
a frightened fellow, there’s one that’ll suit you. Try 
your hand upon him.” 

He pointed, as he spoke, to Dennis, who, with his legs 
trailing on the ground, was held between two men ; and 
who trembled] so, that all his joints and limbs seemed 
racked by spasms. Turning from this wretched spec- 
tacle, he called to Barnaby, who stood apart. 

“ What cheer, Barnaby ? Don’t be downcast, lad. 
Leave that to him” 

“Bless you,” cried Barnaby, stepping lightly towards 
him, “ I’m not frightened, Hugh. I’m quite happy, 
I wouldn’t desire to live now, if they’d let me. Look 
at me ! Am I afraid to die ? Will they see ma 
tremble ? ” 

Hugh gazed for a moment at his face, on which 
there was a strange, unearthly smile ; and at his eye, 
which sparkled brightly ; and interposing between him 
»nd the Ordinary, gruffly whispered to the latter: — 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


249 


“I wouldn’t say much to him, master, if I was you. 
He may spoil your appetite for breakfast, though you 
are used to it.” 

He was the only one of the three who had washed or 
trimmed himself that morning. Neither of the others 
had done so, since their doom was pronounced. He still 
wore the broken peacock’s feathers in his hat ; and all 
his usual scraps of finery were carefully disposed about 
his person. His kindling eye, his firm step, his proud 
and resolute bearing, might have graced some lofty act 
of heroism ; some voluntary sacrifice, born of a noWe 
cause and pure enthusiasm ; rather than that felon’s 
death. 

But all these things increased his guilt. They were 
mere assumptions. The law had declared it so, and so 
it must be. The good minister had been greatly shocked, 
not a quarter of an hour before, at his parting with Grip. 
For one in his condition, to fondle a bird ! 

The yard was filled with people ; bluff civic function- 
aries, officers of justice, soldiers, the curious in such mat- 
ters, and guests who had been bidden as to a wedding. 
Hugh looked about him, nodded gloomily to some per- 
son in authority, who indicated with his hand in what 
direction he was to proceed ; and clapping Barnaby on 
the shoulder, passed out with the gait of a lion. 

They entered a large room, so near to the scaffold that 
the voices of those who stood about it, could be plainly 
heard : some beseeching the javelin-men to take them 
out of the crowd : others crying to those behind, to 
stand back, for they were pressed to death and suffo- 
cating for want of air. 

In the middle of this chamber, two smiths with ham- 
mers, stood beside an anvil. Hugh walked straight up 


250 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


to them, and set his foot upon it with a sound as though 
it had been struck by a heavy weapon. Then, with 
folded arms, he stood to have his irons knocked off: 
scowling haughtily round, as those who were present 
eyed him narrowly and whispered to each other. 

It took so much time to drag Dennis in, that this cere* 
mony was over with Hugh, and nearly over with Bar- 
naby, before he appeared. He no sooner came into the 
place he knew so well, however, and among faces with 
which he was so familiar, than he recovered strength and 
sense enough to clasp his hands and make a last appeal. 

“ Gentlemen, good gentlemen,” cried the abject crea- 
ture, grovelling down upon his knees, and actually pros- 
trating himself upon the stone floor : “ Governor, dear 
governor — honorable sheriffs — worthy gentlemen — have 
mercy upon a wretched man that has served His Maj- 
esty, and the Law, and Parliament, for so many years, 
and don’t — don’t let me die — because of a mistake.” 

“ Dennis,” said the governor of the jail, “ you know 
what the course is, and that the order came with the rest. 
You know that we could do nothing, even if we would.” 

“ All I ask, sir, — all I want and beg, is time, to make 
it sure,” cried the trembling wretch, looking wildly round 
for sympathy. “ The King and Government can’t know 
it’s me ; I’m sure they can’t know it’s me ; or they never 
would bring me- to this dreadful slaughter-house. They 
know my name, but they don’t know it’s the same man. 
Stop my execution — for charity’s sake stop my execu- 
tion, gentlemen — till they can be told that I’ve been 
hangman here, nigh thirty year. Will no cne go and 
tell them ? ” he implored, clinching his hands and glaring 
round, and round, and round again — “will no charitable 
person go and tell them ! ” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


251 


“ Mr. Akerman,” said a gentleman who stood by, after 
a moment’s pause, “ since it may possibly produce in this 
unhappy man a better frame of mind, even at this last 
minute, let me assure him that he was well known to have 
been the hangman, when his sentence was considered.” 

— “But perhaps theythink on that account that the • 
punishment’s not so gi'eat,” cried the criminal, shuffling 
towards this speaker on his knees, and holding up his 
folded hands ; “ whereas it’s worse, it’s worse a hundred 
times, to me than any man. Let them know that, sir. 
Let them know that. They’ve made it worse to me by 
giving me so much to do. Stop my execution till they 
know that ! ” 

The governor beckoned with his hand, and the two 
men, who had supported him before, approached. He 
uttered a piercing cry : — 

“ Wait ! Wait. Only a moment — only one moment 
more ! Give me a last chance of reprieve. One of us 
tliree is to go to Bloomsbury Square. Let me be the 
one. It may come in that time ; it’s sure to come. In 
the Lord’s name let me be sent to Bloomsbury Square. 
Don’t hang me here. It’s murder!” 

They took him to the anvil : but even then he could 
be heard above the clinking of the smith’s hammers, and 
the hoarse raging of the crowd, crying that he knew of 
Hugh’s birth — that his father was living, and was a 
gentleman of influence and rank — that he had family 
jecrets in his possession — that he could tell nothing un- 
less they gave him time, but must die with them on his 
mind ; and he continued to rave in this sort until his 
voice failed him, and he sank down a mere heap of 
tlothes between the two attendants. 

It was at this moment that the clock struck the first 


252 


BARNABT BUDGE. 


Stroke or twelve, and the bell began to toll The various 
officers, with the two sheriffs at their head, moved towards 
the door. All was ready when the last chime came upon 
the ear. 

They told Hugh this, and asked if he had anything to 
say. 

" To say ! ” he cried. ^ Not I. I’m ready. — Yes,” 
he added, as his eye fell upon Bamaby, “ I have a word 
to say, too. Come hither, lad.” 

There was, for the moment, something kind, and even 
tender, struggling in his fierce aspect, as he wrung his 
poor companion by the hand. “ I’ll say this,” he cried, 
looking firmly round, “ that if I had ten lives to lose, and 
the loss of each would give me ten times the agony of 
the hardest death, I’d lay them all down — ay I would, 
though you gentlemen may not believe it — to save this 
one. This one,” he added, wringing his hand again, 
“ that will be lost through me.” 

“ Not through you,” said the idiot, mildly. “ Don’t 
say that You were not to blame. You have been 
always very good to me. — Hugh, we shall know what 
makes the stars shine, now ! ” 

“ I took him from her in a reckless mood, and didn’t 
think what harm would come of it,” said Hugh, laying 
his hand upon his head, and speaking in a lower voice. 
“ I ask her pardon, and his. — Look here,” he added 
roughly, in his former tone. “ You see this lad ? ” 

They murmured “ Yes,” and seemed to wonder why 
he asked. 

“ That gentleman yonder ” — pointing to the clergy- 
man — “ has often in the last few days spoken to me of 
faith, and strong belief. You see what I am — more 
brute than man, — as I have been often told — but I 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


258 


had faith enough to believe, and did believe as strongly 
as any of you gentlemen can believe anything, that this 
one hfe would be spared. See what he is — Look at 
him ! ” 

Barnaby had moved towards the door, and stood beck- 
oning him to follow. 

“ If this was not faith, and strong belief ! ” cried Hugh, 
raising his right arm aloft, and looking upward like a 
savage prophet whom the near approach of Death had 
filled with inspiration, “ where are they ! What else 
should teach me — me, born as I was born, and reared 
as I have been reared — to hope for any mercy in this 
hardened, cruel, unrelenting place ! Upon these human 
shambles, I, who never raised his hand in prayer till 
now, call down the wrath of God ! On that black tree, 
of which I am the ripened fruit, I do invoke the curse 
of all its victims, past, and present, and to come. On 
the head of that man, who in his conscience, owns me 
for his son, I leave the wish that he may never sicken 
on his bed of down, but die a violent death as I do now, 
and have the night-wind for his only mourner. To this 
I say. Amen, amen ! ” 

His arm fell downward by his side ; he turned ; and 
moved towards them with a steady step, the man he had 
been before. 

“ There is nothing more ? ” said the Governor. 

. Hugh motioned Barnaby not to come near him (though 
without looking in the direction where he stood) and an* 

ered, “ There is nothing more.” .. 

“ Move forward ! ” 

— “ Unless,” said Hugh, glancing hurriedly back, 
— “ unless any person here has a fancy for a dog ; 
and not then, unless he means to use him well. There’s 


254 


BARNABY RlTDGE. 


one, belongs to me, at the house I came from, and it 
wouldn’t be easy to find a better. He’ll whine at first, 
but he’ll soon get over that. — You wonder that I think 
about a dog just now,” he added, with a kind of laugh, 
“ If any man deserved it of me half as well, I’d think 
of himr 

He spoke no more, but moved onward in his place, 
with a careless air, though listening at the same time to 
the Service for the Dead, with something between sullen 
attention and quickened curiosity. As soon as he had 
passed the door, his miserable associate was carried out ; 
and the crowd beheld the rest. 

Barnaby would have mounted the steps at the same 
time — indeed he would have gone before them, but in 
both attempts he was restrained, as he was to undergo 
the sentence elsewhere. In a few minutes the sheriffs 
reappeared, the same procession was again formed, and 
they passed through various rooms and passages to an- 
other door — that at which the cart was waiting. He 
held down his head to avoid seeing what he knew his 
eyes must otherwise encounter, and took his seat sorrow- 
fully, and yet with something of a childish pride and 
pleasure, — in the vehicle. The officers fell into their 
places at’ the sides, in front, and in the rear ; the sheriffs* 
carriages rolled on ; a guard of soldiers surrounded the 
whole ; and they moved slowly forward through the 
throng and pressure towards Lord Mansfield’s ruined 
house. 

It was a sad sight — all the show, and strength, and 
glitter, assembled round one helpless creature — and 
sadder yet to note, as he rode along, how his wandering 
thoughts found strange encouragement in the crowded 
ivindows and the concourse in the streets ; and how, 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


2/i5 

even then, he felt the influence of the bright sky, and 
looked up, smiling, into its deep unfathomable blue. 
But there had been many such sights since the riots 
were over — some so moving in their nature, and so 
repulsive too, that they were far more calculated to 
awaken pity for the sufferers, than respect for that law 
whose strong arm seemed in more than one case to be 
as wantonly stretched forth now that all was safe, as it 
had been basely paralyzed in time of danger. 

Two cripples — both mere boys — one with a leg of 
wood, one who dragged his twisted limbs along by the 
help of a crutch, were hanged in this same Bloomsbury 
Square. As the cart was about to glide from under 
them, it was observed that they stood with their faces 
from, not to, the house they had assisted to despoil ; and 
their misery was protracted that this omission might be 
remedied. Another boy was hanged in Bow Street ; 
other young lads to various quarters of the town. Four 
wretched women, too, were put to death. In a word, 
those who suffered as rioters were, for the most part, the 
weakest, meanest, and most miserable among them. It 
was an exquisite satire upon the false religious cry 
which had led to so much misery, that some of these 
people owned themselves to be catholics, and begged to 
be attended by their own priests. 

One young man was hanged in Bishopsgate Street, 
whose aged gray-headed father waited for him at the 
gallows, kissed him at its foot when he arrived, and sat 
there on the ground, until they took him down. They 
would have given him the body of his child ; but he 
had no hearse, no coffin, nothing to remove it in, being 
too poor — and walked meekly away beside the oart 
that took it back to prison, trying as he went to touch 
its lifeless hand. 


256 


BARNABY KUDGE. 


But, the crowd had forgotten these matters, or cared 
little about them if they lived in their memory ; and 
while oqe great multitude fought and hustled to get 
near the gibbet before Newgate, for a parting look, 
another followed in the train of poor lost Barnaby, to 
swell the throng that waited for him on the spot 









BARN A BY RUDGE. 


257 


CHAPTER LXXVIII 

^ On this same day, and about this very hour, Mr 
Willet, the elder, sat smoking his pipe in a chamber of 
the Black Lion. Although it was hot summer weather, 
Mr. Willet sat close to the fire. He was in a state of 
profound cogitation, with his own thoughts, and it was 
his custom at such times to stew himself slowly, under 
the impression that that process of cookery was favora- 
ble to the melting out of his ideas, which, when he 
began to simmer, sometimes oozed forth so copiously as 
to astonish even himself. 

Mr. Willet bad been several thousand times comforted 
by his friends and acquaintance, with the assurance that 
for the loss he had sustained in the damage done to the 
Maypole, he could “ come upon the county.” But as 
this phrase happened to bear an unfortunate resemblance 
to the popular expression of “ coming on the parish,” it 
suggested to Mr. Willetts mind no more consolatoiy vis- 
ions than pauperism on an extensive scale, and ruin in 
a capacious aspect. Consequently, he had never failed 
to receive the intelligence with a rueful shake of the 
li^d, or a dreary stare, and had been always observed 
to appear much more melancholy after a visit of condo- 
lence than at any other time in the whole four-and-twenty 
hours. 

It chanced, however, that sitting over the fire on this 
particular occasion — perhaps because he was, as it were, 

VOL. III. 17 


258 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


done to a turn ; perhaps because he was in an unusually 
bright state of mind ; perhaps because he had considered 
the subject so long ; perhaps because of all these favoring 
circumstances taken together — it chanced that, sitting 
over the fire on this particular occasion, Mr. Willet did, 
afar off and in the remotest depths of his intellect, per- 
ceive a kind of lurking hint or faint suggestion, that out 
of the public purse there might issue funds for the res- 
toration of the Maypole to its former high place among 
the taverns of the earth. And this dim ray of light did 
so diffuse itself within him, and did so kindle up and 
shine, that at last he had it as plainly and visibly be- 
fore him as the blaze by which he sat : and fully per- 
suaded that he was the first to make the discovery, 
and that he had started, hunted down, fallen upon, and 
knocked on the head, a perfectly original idea which 
had never presented itself to any other man, alive or 
dead, he laid down his pipe, rubbed his hands,* and 
chuckled audibly. 

“ Why, father ! ” cried Joe, entering at the moment, 
“ you’re in spirits to-day ! ” 

“ It’s nothing partickler,” said Mr. Willet, chuckling 
again. “ It’s nothing at all partickler, Joseph. Tell me 
something about the Salwanners.” Having preferred 
this request, Mr. Willet chuckled a third time, and after 
these unusual demonstrations of levity, he put his pipe 
in his mouth again. 

“ What shall I tell you, father ? ” asked Joe, laying 
his hand upon his sire’s shoulder, and looking down 
into his face. “ That I have come back, poorer than 
a church mouse. You know that. That I have come 
back, maimed and crippled ? You know that.” 

“ It was took off,” muttered Mr. Willet, with his eyes 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


259 


upon the fire, “ at the defence of the Salvvanners, in 
America, where the war is.” 

“ Quite right,” returned Joe, smiling, and leaning with 
his remaining elbow on the back of his father’s chair ; 
“ the very subject I came to speak to you about. A 
man with one arm, father, is not of much use in the 
busy world.” 

This was one of those vast propositions which Mr. 
Willet had never considered for an instant, and required 
time to “ tackle.” Wherefore he made no answer. 

“ At all events,” said Joe, “ he can’t pick and choose 
his means of earning a livelihood, as another man may. 
He can’t say ‘ I will turn my hand to this,’ or ‘ I won’t 
turn my hand to that,’ but must take what he can do, 
and be thankful it’s no worse. — What did you say ? ” 

Mr. Willet had been softly repeating to himself, in a 
musing tone, the words “ defence of the Salwanners : ” 
but he seemed embarrassed at having been overheard, 
and answered “ Nothing.” 

“ Now look here, father. — Mr. Edward has come to 
England from the West Indies. When he was lost 
sight of (I ran away on the same day, father), he made 
a voyage to one of the islands, where a school-friend of 
his had settled ; and, finding him, wasn’t too proud to 
be employed on his estate, and — and in short, got on 
well, and is prospering, and has come over here on busi- 
ness of his own, and is going back again speedily. Oui 
returning nearly at the same time, and meeting in the 
course of the late troubles, has been a good thing every 
way ; for it has not only enabled us to do old friends 
iX)me service, but has opened a path in life for me which 
I may tread without being a burden upon you. To bo 
plain, father, he can 'employ me; I have satisfied my- 


260 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


self that I can be of real use to him ; and I am going 
to carry my one arm away with him, and to make the 
most of it.” 

In the mind’s eye of Mr. Willet, the West Indies, and 
indeed all foreign countries, were inhabited by savage 
nations, who were perpetually burying pipes of peace, 
flourishing tomahawks, and puncturing strange patterns 
in their bodies. He no sooner heard this announcement, 
therefore, than he leaned back in his chair, took his pipe 
from his lips, and stared at his son with as much dismay 
as if he already beheld him tied to a stake, and tortured 
for the entertainment of a lively population. In what 
form of expression his feelings would have found a vent, 
it is impossible to say. Nor is it necessary : for, before 
a syllable occurred to him, Dolly Varden came running 
into the room, in tears, threw herself on Joe’s breast 
without a word of explanation, and clasped her white 
arms round his neck. 

“ Dolly ! ” cried Joe. “ Dolly ! ” 

“ Ay, call me that ; call me that always,” exclaimed 
the locksmith’s little daughter ; “ never speak coldly to 
me, never be distant, never again reprove me for the 
fallies I have long repented, or I shall die, Joe.” 

" I reprove you ! ” said Joe. 

“ Yes — for every kind and honest word you uttered, 
went to my heart. For you, who have borne so much 
from me — for you, who owe your sufferings and pain 
to my caprice — for you to be so kind — so noble to me, 
Joe ” — 

He could say nothing to her. Not a syllable. There 
was an odd sort of eloquence in his one arm, which had 
crept round her waist : but his lips were mute. 

“ If you had reminded me by a word — only by one 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


261 


short word,” sobbed Dolly, clinging yet closer to him, 
“ how little I deserved that you should treat me with so 
much forbearance ; if you had exulted only for one mo- 
ment in your tnumph, I could have borne it better.” 

“ Triumph ! ” repeated Joe, with a smile which seemed 
to say, “ I am a pretty figure for that.” 

“ Yes, triumph,” she cried, with her whole heart and 
soul in her earnest voice, and gushing tears ; “ for it is 
one. I am glad to think and know it is. I wouldn’t be 
less humbled, dear — I wouldn’t be without the recollec- 
tion of that last time we spoke together in this place — 
no, not if I could recall the past, and make our parting 
yesterday.” 

Did ever lover look as Joe looked now ! 

“ Dear Joe,” said Dolly, “ I always loved you — in 
my own heart I always did, although I was so vain and 
giddy. I hoped you would come back that night. I 
made quite sure you would. I prayed for it on my 
knees. Through all these long, long years, I have never 
once forgotten you, or left off hoping that this happy 
time might come.” 

The eloquence of Joe’s arm surpassed the most impas- 
sioned language ; and so did that of his lips — yet he 
said nothing, either. 

“ And now, at last,” cried Dolly, trembling with the 
fervor of her speech, “ if you were sick, and shattered 
in your every limb ; if you were ailing, weak, and sor- 
rowful; if, instead of being what you are, you were in 
everybody’s eyes but mine the wreck and ruin of a man ; 
I would be your wife, dear love, with greater pride and 
joy, than if you were the stateliest lord in England ! ” 

“ What have I done,” cried Joe, “ what have I done 
to meet with this reward ? ” 


262 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ You have taught me,” said Dolly, raising her pretty 
face to his, “ to know myself, and your worth ; to be 
something better than I was ; to be more deserving of 
your true and manly nature. In years to come, dear 
Joe, you shall find that you have done so ; for I will be, 
not only now, when we are young and full of hope, but 
when we have grown old and weary, your patient, gentle, 
never-tiring wife. I will never know a wish or care be- 
yond our home and you, and I will always study how to 
please you with my best affection and my most devoted 
love. I will : indeed I will ! ” 

Joe could only repeat his former eloquence — but it 
was very much to the purpose. 

“ They know of this, at home,” said Dolly. “ For 
your sake, I would leave even them ; but they know it, 
and are glad of it, and are as proud of you as I am, and 
as full of gratitude. — You’ll not come and see me as a 
poor friend who knew me when I was a girl, will you, 
dear Joe ? ” 

Well, well ! It don’t matter what Joe said in answer, 
but he said a great deal; and Dolly said a great deal 
too : and he folded Dolly in his one arm pretty tight, 
considering that it was but one ; and Dolly made no re- 
sistance : and if ever two people were happy in this 
world — which is not an utterly miserable one, with all 
its faults — we may, with some appearance of certainty, 
conclude that they were. 

To say that during these proceedings Mr. Willet the 
elder underwent the greatest emotions of astonishment 
of which our common nature is susceptible — to say that 
he was in a perfect paralysis of surprise, and that he 
wandered into the most stupendous and theretofore unat- 
tainable heights of complicated amazement — would be 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


263 


to shadow forth his state of mind in the feeblest and 
/amest terms. If a roc, an eagle, a griffin, a flying ele- 
phant, a winged sea-horse, had suddenly appeared, and, 
taking him on its back, carried him bodily into the heart 
of the “ Salwanners,” it would have been to him as an 
every-day occurrence, in comparison with what he now 
beheld. To be sitting quietly by, seeing and hearing 
these things ; to be completely overlooked, unnoticed, 
and disregarded, while his son and a young lady were 
talking to each other in the most impassioned manner, 
kissing each other, and making themselves in all respects 
perfectly at home ; was a position so tremendous, so inex- 
plicable, so utterly beyond the widest range of his capac- 
ity of comprehension, that he fell into a lethargy of won- 
der, and could no more rouse himself than an enchanted 
sleeper in the first year of his fairy lease, a century long. 

“ Father,” said Joe, presenting Dolly. “ You know 
who this is?” 

Mr. Willet looked first at her, then at his son, then 
back again at Dolly, and then made an ineffectual effort 
to extract a whiff from his pipe, which had gone out long 
ago. 

“ Say a word, father, if it’s only ‘ how d’ye do,’ ” urged 

Joe. 

“ Certainly, Joseph,” answered Mr. Willet. “ Oh yes ! 
Why not?” 

“ To be sure,” said Joe. ** Why not ? ” 

“ Ah ! ” replied his father. “ Why not ? ” and with 
this remark, which he uttered in a low voice as though 
be were discussing some grave question with himself, he 
used the little finger* — if any of his fingers can be said 
to have come under that denomination — of his right 
band as a tobacco-stopper, and was silent again. 


264 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


And so he sat for half an hour at least, although Dolly, 
in the most endearing of manners, hoped a dozen times, 
that he was not angry with her. So he sat for half an 
hour, quite motionless, and looking all the while like 
nothing so much as a great Dutch Pin or Skittle. At 
the expiration of that period, he suddenly, and without 
the least notice, burst (to the great consternation of the 
young people) into a very loud and very short laugh ; 
and repeating “ Certainly, Joseph. Oh yes I Why 
not?” went out for a walk. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


265 


CHAPTER LXXIX. 

Old John did not walk near the Golden Key, for be- 
tween the Golden Key and the Black Lion there lay a 
wilderness of streets — as everybody knows who is ac- 
quainted with the relative bearings of Clerkenwell and 
Whitechapel — and he was by no means famous for 
pedestrian exercises. But the Golden Key lies in our 
way, though it was out of his ; so to the Golden Key 
this chapter goes. » 

The Golden Key itself, fair emblem of the locksmith’s 
trade, had been pulled down by the rioters, and roughly 
trampled under foot. But, now, it was hoisted up again 
in all the glory of a new coat of paint, and showed more 
bravely even than in days of yore. Indeed the whole 
house-front was spruce and trim, and so freshened up 
throughout, that if there yet remained at large any of 
the rioters who had been concerned in the attack upon 
it, the sight of the old, goodly, prosperous dwelling, so 
revived, must have been to them as gall and worm* 
wood. 

The shutters of the shop were closed, however, and 
the window-blinds above were all pulled down, and in 
place of its usual cheerful appearance, the house had a 
look of sadness and an air of mourning ; which the neigh- 
bors, who in old days had often seen poor Barnaby go in 
and out, were at no loss to understand. The door stood 
partly open ; but the locksmith’s hammer was unheard ; 


266 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


the cat sat moping on the ashy forge ; all was deserted, 
dark, and silent. 

On the threshold of this door, Mr. Haredale and 
Edward Chester met. The younger man gave place ; 
and both passing in with a familiar air, which seemed tc 
denote that they were tarrying there or were well-ac- 
customed to go to and fro unquestioned, shut it behind 
him. 

Entering the old back-parlor, and ascending the flight 
of stairs, abrupt and steep, and quaintly fashioned as of 
old, they turned into the best room ; the pride of Mrs. 
Varden’s heart, and erst the scene of Miggs’s household 
labors. 

“ Varden brought the mother here last evening, he 
told me?” said Mr. Haredale. 

“ She is above-stairs now — in the room over here,” 
Edward rejoined. “ Her grief, they say, is past all tell- 
ing. I needn’t add — for that you know beforehand, sir 
— that the care, humanity, and sympathy of these good 
people have no bounds.” 

“ I am sure of that. Heaven repay them for it, and 
for much more ! Varden is out ? ” 

“ He returned with your messenger, who arrived al- 
most at the moment of his coming home himself. He 
was out the whole night — but that of course you know. 
He was with you the greater part of it ? ” 

“ He was. Without him, I should have lacked my 
right hand. He is an older man than I ; but nothing 
can conquer him.” 

“ The cheeriest, stoutest-hearted fellow in the world.” 

“ He has a right to be. He has a right to be. A 
better creature never lived. He reaps what he has sown 
•— no more.” 


BAR NAB Y KUDGE. 


267 


“It is not all men,” said Edward, after a moment’s 
hesitation, “ who have the happiness to do that.” 

“More than you imagine,” returned Mr. Haredale. 
“We note the harvest more than the seed-time. You 
do so in me.” 

In truth his pale and haggard face, and gloomy bear- 
ing, had so far influenced the remark, that Edward was, 
for the moment, at a loss to answer him. 

“ Tut, tut,” said Mr. Haredale, “ ’twas not very diffi* 
cult to read a thought so natural. But you are mistaken 
nevertheless. I have had my share of sorrows — more 
than the common lot, perhaps — but I have borne them 
ill. I have broken where I should have bent ; and have 
mused and brooded, when ray spirit should have mixed 
with all God’s great creation. The men who learn en- 
durance, are they who call the whole world brother. I 
have turned from the world, and I pay the penalty.” 

Edward would have interposed, but he went on with- 
out giving him time. 

“ It is too late to evade it now. I sometimes think, 
that if I had to live my life once more, I might amend 
this fault — not so much, I discover when I search my 
mind, for the love of what is right, as for my own sake. 
But even when I make these better resolutions, I in- 
stinctively recoil from the idea of suffering again what I 
have undergone ; and in this circumstance I find the un- 
welcome assurance that I should still be the same man, 
though I could cancel the past, and begin anew, with its 
experience to guide me.” 

“ Nay, you make too sure of that,” said Edward. 

“ You think so,” Mr. Haredale answered, “ and I am 
glad you do. I know myself better, and therefore dis- 
trust myself more. Let us leave this subject for another 


268 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


«— not so far removed from it as it might, at first sight, 
seem to be. Sir, you still love my niece, and she is still 
attached to you.” 

“I have that assurance from her own lips,” said Ed- 
wardj “ and you know — I am sure you know — that I 
would not exchange it for any blessing life could yield 
me.” 

“You are frank, honorable, and disinterested,” said 
Mr. Haredale ; “ you have forced the conviction that 
you are so, even on my once-jaundiced mind, and I be- 
-lieve you. Wait here till I come back.” 

He left the room as he spoke ; but soon returned with 
his niece. 

“ On that first and only time,” he said, looking from 
the one to the other, “ when we three stood together un- 
der her father’s roof, I told you to quit it, and charged 
you never to return.” 

“It is the only circumstance arising out of our love,” 
observed Edward, “that I have forgotten.” 

“ You own a name,” said Mr. Haredale, “ I had deep 
reason to remember. I was moved and goaded by recol- 
lections of personal wrong and injury, I know, but, even 
now I cannot charge myself with having, then, or ever, 
lost sight of a heartfelt desire for her true happiness ; oi 
with having acted — however much I was mistaken-— 
with any other impulse than the one pure, single, earnest 
wish to be to her, as far as in my inferior nature lay, the 
father she had lost.” 

“ Dear uncle,” cried Emma, “I have known no parent 
but you. I have loved the memory of others, but I have 
loved you all my life. Never was father kinder to hig 
child than you have been to me, without the interval cf 
one harsh hour, since I can first remember.” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


269 


“You speak too fondly,” he answered, “and yet 1 
cannot wish you were less partial ; for I have a pleasure 
in hearing those words, and shall have in calling them to 
mind when we are far asunder, which nothing else could 
give me. Bear with me for a moment longer, Edward, 
for she and I have been together many years ; and al- 
though I believe that in resigning her to you I put the 
seal upon her future happiness, I find it needs an efibrt.” 

He pressed her tenderly to his bosom, and after a 
minute’s pause, resumed : — 

“ I have done you wrong, sir, and I ask your forgive- 
ness — in no common phrase, or show of sorrow ; but 
with earnestness and sincerity. In the same spirit, I 
acknowledge to you both that the time has been when I 
connived at treachery and falsehood — which if I did 
not perpetrate myself, I still permitted — to rend you 
two asunder.” 

“ You judge yourself too harshly,” said Edward. 
“ Let these things rest.” 

“ They rise up in judgment against me when I look 
back, and not now for the first time,” he answered. “ I 
cannot part from you without your full forgiveness ; for 
busy life and 1 have little left in common now, and I 
have regrets enough to carry into solitude, without addi- 
tion to the stock.” 

“You bear a blessing from us both,” said Emma. 
“ Never mingle thoughts of me — of me who owe you 
BO much love and duty — with anything but undying 
affection and gratitude for the past, and bright hopes for 
:he future.” 

“ The future,” returned her uncle, with a melancholy 
praile, “ is a bright word for you, and its image should be 
wreathed with cheerful hopes. Mine is of another kind, 


270 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


but it will be one of peace, and free, I trust, from care 
or passion. When you quit England I shall leave it too. 
There are cloisters abroad ; and now that the two great 
objects of my life are set at rest, I know no better home. 
You droop at that, forgetting I am growing old, and that 
my course is nearly run. Well, we will speak of it 
again — not once or twice, but many times ; and you 
shall give me cheerful counsel, Emma.’* 

“ And you will take it ? ” asked his niece. 

“I’ll listen to it,” he answered, with a kiss, “and it 
will have its weight, be certain. What have I left to 
say You have, of late, been much together. It is 
better and more fitting that the circumstances attendant 
on the past, which wrought your separation, and sowed 
between you suspicion and distrust, should not be en- 
tered on by me.” 

“Much, much better,” whispered Emma. 

“ I avow my share in them,” said Mr. Haredale, 
“ though I held it, at the time, in detestation. Let no 
man turn aside, ever so slightly, from the broad path of 
honor, on the plausible pretence that he is justified by 
the goodness of his end. All good ends can be worked 
out by good means. Those that cannot, are bad ; and 
may be counted so at once, and left alone.” 

He looked from her to Edward, and said in a gentler 
tone : — 

“ In goods and fortune you are now nearly equal. I 
liuve been her faithful steward, and to that remnant of a 
richer property which ray brother left her, I desire to 
add, in token of my love, a poor pittance, scarcely worth 
the mention, for which I have no longer any need. I 
am glad you go abroad. Let our ill-fated house remain 
the ruin it is. When you return, after a few thriving 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


271 


years, you will command a better, and a move fortunate 
one. We are friends ? ” 

Edward took his extended hand, and grasped it 
heartily. 

“You are neither slow nor cold in your response,” 
said Mr. Haredale, doing the like by him, “ and when I 
look upon you now, and know you, I feel that I would 
choose you for her husband. Her father had a generous 
nature, and you w'ould have pleased him well. I give 
her to you in his name, and with his blessing. If the 
world and I part in this act, we part on happier terms 
than we have lived for many a day.” 

He placed her in his arms, and would have left the 
room, 'but that he was stopped in his passage to the door 
by a great noise at a distance, which made them start 
and pause. 

It w'as a loud shouting, mingled with boisterous accla- 
mations, that rent the very air. It drew nearer and 
nearer every moment, and approached so rapidly, that, 
even while they listened, it burst into a deafening con- 
fusion of sounds at the street corner. 

“ This must be stopped — quieted,” said Mr. Hare- 
dale, hastily. “ We should have foreseen this, and pro- 
vided against it. I will go out to them at once.” 

But, before he could reach the door, and before Ed- 
ward could catch up his hat and follow him, they were 
again arrested by a loud shriek from above-stairs : and 
the locksmith’s wife, bursting in, and fairly running into 
Mr. Haredale’s arms, cried out : — 

“ She knows it all, dear sir ! — she knows it all ! We 
broke it out to her by degrees, and she is quite pre- 
pared.” Having made this communication, and further- 
more thanked Heaven with great fervor and heartiness, 


272 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


the good lady, according to the custom of matrons on all 
occasions of excitement, fainted away directly. 

They ran to the window, threw up the sash, and 
looked into the crowded street. Among a dense mob 
of persons, of whom not one was for an instant still, the 
locksmith’s ruddy face and burly form could be descried, 
beating about as though he was struggling with a rough 
sea. Now, he was carried back a score of yards, now 
onward nearly to the door, now^ back again, now forced 
against the opposite houses, now against those adjoining 
his own : now^ carried up a flight of steps, and greeted 
by the outstretched hands of half a hundred men, while 
the whole tumultuous concourse stretched their throats, 
and cheered with all their might. Though he was really 
in a fair way to be torn to pieces in the general enthusi- 
asm, the locksmith, nothing discomposed, echoed their 
shouts till he was hoarse as they, and in a glow of joy 
and right good-humor, waved his hat until the daylight 
shone between its brim and crown. 

But in all the bandyings from hand to hand, and striv- 
ings to and fro, and sweepings here and there, which — 
saving that he looked more jolly and more radiant after 
every struggle — troubled his peace of mind no more 
than if he had been a straw upon the water’s surface, he 
never once released his firm grasp of an arm, drawn 
tight through his. He sometimes turned to clap this 
friend upon the back, or whisper in his ear a word of 
stanch encouragement, or cheer him with a smile ; but 
his great care was to shield him from the pressure, and 
force a passage for him to the Golden Key. Passive 
and timid, scared, pale, and wondering, and gazing at the 
throng as if he were newly risen from the dead, and felt 
himself a ghost among the living, Barnaby — not Bar- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


273 


naby in the spirit, but in flesh and blood, with pulses, 
sinews, nerves, and beating heart, and strong affections 
' — clung to his stout old friend, and followed where he 
led. 

And thus, in course of time, they reached the door, 
held ready for their entrance by no unwilling hands. 
Then slipping in, and shutting out the crowd by main 
force, Gabriel stood between Mr. Haredale and Edward 
Chester, and Barnaby, rushing up the stairs, fell upon 
his knees beside his mother’s bed. 

“ Such is the blessed end, sir,” cried the panting lock- 
smith, to Mr. Haredale, ‘^of the best day’s work we ever 
did. The rogues ! it’s been hard fighting to get away 
from ’em. I almost thought, once or twice, they’d have 
been too much for us with their kindness ! ” 

They had striven, all the previous day, to rescue Bar- 
naby from his impending fate. Failing in their attempts, 
in the first quarter to which they addressed themselves, 
they renewed them in another. Failing there, likewise, 
they began afresh at midnight ; and made their way, not 
only to the judge and jury who had tried him, but to 
men of influence at court, to the young Prince of Wales, 
and even to the antechamber of the king himself. Suc- 
cessful at last, in awakening an interest in his favor, and 
an inclination to inquire more dispassionately into his 
case, they had had an interview with the minister, in his 
bed, so late as eight o’clock that morning. The result 
of a searching inquiry (in which they, who had known 
;he poor fellow from his childhood, did other good service 
besides bringing it about) was, that between eleven and 
twelve o’clock, a free pardon to Barnaby Rudge was 
made out and signed, and intrusted to a horse-soldier for 
instant conveyance to the place of execution. This 

vf.i, iir 18 


274 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


courier reached 'the spot just, as the cart appeared in 
sight ; and Barnaby being carried back to jail, Mr. 
Haredale, assured that all was safe, had gone straight 
from Bloomsbury Square to the Golden Key, leaving to 
Gabriel the grateful task of bringing him home in tri- 
umph. 

“ I needn’t say,” observed the locksmith, when he had 
shaken hands with all the males in the house, and 
hugged all the females, five-and-forty times, at least, 
“ that, except among ourselves, I didn’t want to make a 
triumph of it. But, directly we got into the street we 
were known, and this hubbub began. Of the two,” he 
added, as he wiped his crimson face, “ and after expe- 
rience of both, I think I’d rather be taken out of my 
house by a crowd of enemies, than escorted home by a 
mob of friends ! ” 

It was plain enough, however, that this was mere talk 
on Gabriel’s part, and that the whole proceeding afforded 
him the keenest delight ; for the people continuing to 
make a great noise without, and to cheer as if their 
voices were in the freshest order, and good for a fort- 
night, he sent up-stairs for Grip (who had come home at 
his master’s back, and had acknowledged the favors of 
the multitude by drawing blood from every finger that 
came within his reach), and with the bird upon his arm, 
presented himself at the first-floor window, and waved 
his hat again until it dangled by a shred, between his 
fingers and thumb. This demonstration having b^en re- 
ceived with appropriate shouts, and silence being in 
some degree restored, he thanked them for their sympa- 
thy ; and taking the liberty to inform them that there 
was a sick person in the house, proposed that they 
should give tliree cheers for King George, three more 


BARiSTABY BUDGE. 


275 


for Old England, and three more for nothing particular, 
ns a closing ceremony. The crowd assenting, substituted 
Gabriel Varden for the nothing particular ; and giving 
him one over, for good measure, dispersed in high good- 
humor. 

What congratulations were exchanged among the in- 
mates at the Golden Key, when they were left alone ; 
what an overflowing of joy and happiness there was 
among them ; how incapable it was of' expression in 
Barnaby’s own person ; and how he went wildly from 
one to another, until he became so far tranquillized, as 
to stretch himself on the ground beside his mother’s 
couch, and fall into a deep sleep ; are matters that need 
not be told. And it is well they happened to be of this 
class, for they would be very hard to tell, were their nar- 
ration ever so indispensable. 

Before leaving this bright picture, it may be well to 
glance at a dark and very different one which was pre- 
sented to only a few eyes, that same night. 

The scene was a church-yard ; the time, midnight ; the 
persons, Edward Chester, a clergyman, a grave-digger, 
and the four bearers of a homely coffin. They stood 
about a grave which had been newly dug, and one of the 
bearers held up a dim lantern, — the only light there, — 
which shed its feeble ray upon the book of prayer. He 
placed it for a moment on the coffin, when he and his 
companions were about to lower it down. There was no 
inscription on the lid. 

The mould fell solemnly upon the last house of this 
nameless man ; and the rattling dust left a dismal echo 
»ven in the accustomed ears of those who had borne it 
to its resting-place. The grave was filled in to the top, 
jmd trodden down. They all left the spot together. 


276 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ You never saw him, living ? ” asked the clergyman 
of Edward. 

Often, years ago ; not knowing him for my brother.** 
“ Never since ? ’* 

“Never. Yesterday, he steadily refused to see me. 
It was urged upon him, many times, at my desire.” 

“ Still he refused ? That was hardened and unnatu- 
ral.’* 

“ Do you think so ? ** 

“ I infer that you do not ? ” 

You are right We hear the world wonder, every 
day, at monsters of ingratitude. Did it never occur to 
you that it often looks for monsters of affection, as 
though they were things of course ? ** 

They had reached the gate by this time, and bidding 
each other good-night, departed on their separate ways. 


I 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


277 


CHAPTER LXXX. 

That afternoon, when he had slept oflP his fatigue ; 
had shaved, and washed, and dressed, and freshened 
himself from top to toe ; when he had dined, comforted 
himself with a pipe, an extra Toby, a nap in the great 
arm-chair, and a quiet chat with Mrs. Varden on every- 
thing that had happened, was happening, or about to 
happen, within the sphere of their domestic concern ; 
the locksmith sat himself down at the tea-table in the 
little back-parlor : the rosiest, cosiest, merriest, heartiest, 
best-contented old buck, in Great Britain or out of 
it. 

There he sat, with his beaming eye on Mrs. V., and 
his shining face suffused with gladness, and his capacious 
waistcoat smiling in every wrinkle, and his jovial humor 
peeping from under the table in the very plumpness of 
his legs : a sight to turn the vinegar of misanthropy into 
purest milk of human kindness. There he sat, watch- 
ing his wife as she decorated the room with flowers for 
the greater honor of Dolly and Joseph Willet, who had 
gone out walking, and for whom the tea-kettle had been 
singing gayly on the hob full twenty minutes, chirping 
as never kettle chirped before ; for whom the best ser- 
vice of real undoubted china, patterned with divers 
••ound-faced mandarins holding up broad umbrellas, was 
now displayed in all its glory ; to tempt whose appetites 
R clear, transparent, juicy ham, garnished with cool 


278 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


green lettuce-leaves and fragrant cucumber, reposed upon 
a shady table, covered with a snow-white cloth ; for whose 
delight, preserves and jams, crisp cakes and other pas- 
try, short to eat, with cunning twists, and cottage loaves, 
and rolls of bread both white and brown, were all set 
forth in rich profusion ; in whose youth Mrs. V. herself 
had grown quite young, and stood there in a gown of 
red and white : symmetrical in figure, buxom in bodice, 
ruddy in cheek and lip, faultless in ankle, laughing in 
face and mood,' in all respects delicious to behold — there 
sat the locksmith among all and every these delights, the 
sun that shone upon them all : the centre of the system : 
the source of light, heat, life, and frank enjoyment in the 
bright household world. 

And when had Dolly ever been the Dolly of that af- 
ternoon? To see how she came in arm-in-arm with Joe;* 
and how she made an effort not to blush or seem at all 
confused ; and how she made believe she didn’t care to 
sit on his side of the table ; and how she coaxed the 
locksmith in a whisper not to joke ; and how her color 
came and went in a little restless flutter of happiness, 
which made her do everything wrong, and yet so charm- 
ingly wrong that it was better than right ! — why, the 
locksmith could have looked on at this (as he mentioned 
to Mrs. Varden when they retired for the night) for 
four-and-twenty hours at a stretch, and never wished it 
done. 

The recollections, too, with which they made merry 
over that long-protracted tea ! The glee with which 
the locksmith asked Joe if he remembered that stormy 
aight at the Maypole when he first asked after Dolly — 
the laugh they all had, about that night when she was 
going out to the party in the sedan-chair — the unmer- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


279 


ciful manner in which they rallied Mrs. Varden about 
putting those flowers outside that very window — the 
difficulty Mrs. Varden found in joining the laugh against 
herself, at first, and the extraordinary perception she had 
of the joke when she overcame it — the confidential 
statements of Joe concerning the precise day and houi 
when he was first conscious of being fond of Dolly, and 
Dolly’s blushing admissions, half-volunteered and half 
extorted, as to the time from which she dated the dis- 
covery that she “ didn’t mind ” Joe — here was an ex- 
haustless fund of mirth and conversation ! 

Then, there was a great deal to be said regarding 
Mrs. Varden’s doubts, and motherly alarms, and shrewd 
suspicions : and it appeared that from Mrs. Varden’s 
penetration and extreme sagacity nothing had ever been 
hidden. She had known it all along. She had seen 
it from the first. She had always predicted it. She 
had been aware of it before the principals. She had 
said within herself (for she remembered the exact 
words) “ that young Willet is certainly looking after our 
Dolly, and I must look after him.” Accordingly, she 
had looked after him, and had observed many little cir- 
cumstances (all of which she named) so exceedingly 
minute that nobody else could make anything out of 
them even now ; and had, it seemed from first to last, 
displayed the most unbounded tact and most consummate 
generalship. 

Of course the night when Joe would ride homeward 
by the side of the chaise, and when Mrs. Varden would 
nsist upon his going back again, was not forgotten — 
nor the night when Dolly fainted on his name being men- 
tioned — nor the times upon times when Mrs. Varden, 
ever watchful and prudent, had found her pining in her 


280 


13AKNABY RUDGE. 


own chamber. In short, nothing was forgotten ; and every- 
thing by some means or other brought them back to the 
conclusion, that that was the happiest hour in all their 
lives ; consequently, that everytfnng must have occurred 
for the best, and nothing could be suggested which would 
have made it better. 

While they were in the full glow of such discourse as 
this, there came a startling knock at the door, opening 
from the street into the workshop, Avhich had been kept 
closed all day that the house might be more quiet. Joe, 
as in duty bound, would hear of nobody but himself 
going to open it ; and accordingly left the room for that 
purpose. 

It would have been odd enough, certainly, if Joe had 
forgotten the way to this door ; and even if he had, as 
it was a pretty large one and stood straight before him, 
he could not easily have missed it. But Dolly, perhaps 
because she w^as in the flutter of spirits before men- 
tioned, or perhaps because she thought he w’ould not be 
able to open it with his one arm — she could have had 
no other reason — hurried out after hhn ; ’ and they 
stopped so long in the passage — no doubt owing to 
Joe’s entreaties that she -would not expose herself to 
the draught of July air which must infallibly come 
rushing in on this same door being opened — that the 
knock was repeated, in a yet more startling manner 
than before. 

“ Is anybody going to open that door ? ” cried the lock- 
smith. “ Or shall I come ? ” 

Upon that, Dolly went running back into the parlor, 
all dimples and blushes ; and Joe opened it with a 
mighty noise, and other superfluous demonstrations of 
jeing in a violent hurry. 


BAHNABY RUDGE. 


281 


“ Well,” said the locksmith, when he reappeared : 
^ what is it ? eh Joe ? what are you laughing at ? ” 

“ Nothing sir. It’s coming in.” 

“ Who’s coming in ? what’s coming in ? ” Mrs. Var- 
den, as much at a loss as her husband, could only shake 
her head in answer to his inquiring look : so, the lock- 
smith wheeled his chair round to command a better view 
of the room-door, and stared at it with his eyes wide 
open, and a mingled expression of curiosity and wonder 
shining in his jolly face. 

Instead of some person or persons straightw'ay ap- 
pearing, divers remarkable sounds were heard, first in 
the workshop and afterwards in the little dark passage 
between it and the parlor, as though some unwieldy chest 
or heavy piece of furniture were being brought in, by 
an amount of human strength inadequate to the task. 
At length after much struggling and bumping, and bruis- 
ing of the wall on both sides, the door was forced open 
as by a battering-ram; and the locksmith, steadily re- 
garding what appeared beyond, smote his thigh, elevated 
his eyebrows, opened his mouth, and cried in a loud voice 
expressive of the utmost consternation : — 

“ Damme, if it a’n’t Miggs come back ! ” 

The young damsel whom he named no sooner heard 
these words, than deserting a very small boy and a very 
large box by which she was accompanied, and advancing 
with such precipitation that her bonnet dew off her head, 
burst into the room, clasped her hands (in which she held 
a pair of pattens, one in each), raised her eyes devotedly 
to the ceiling, and shed a flood of tears. 

“ The old story ! ” cried the locksmith, looking at her 
in inexpressible desperation. “ She was born to be a 
damper, this young woman ! nothing can prevent it I ” 


282 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


“ Ho master, ho mim ! ” cried Miggs, “ can I constrain 
my feelings in these here once agin united moments ! 
Ho Mr. Warsen, here’s blessedness among relations, sir ! 
Here’s forgiveness of injuries, here’s amicableness ! ” 

The locksmith looked from his wife to Dolly, and from 
Dolly to Joe, and from Joe to Miggs, with his eyebrows 
still elevated and his mouth still open. When his eyes 
got back to Miggs, they rested on her ; fascinated. 

“ To think,” cried Miggs with hysterical joy, “ that 
Mr. Joe, and dear Miss Dolly, has raly come together 
after all as has been said and done contrairy ! To see 
them two a-settin’ along with him and her, so pleasant 
and in all respects so affable and mild ; and me not know- 
ing of it, and not being in the ways to make no prepara- 
tions for their teas. Ho what a cutting thing it is, and 
yet what sweet sensations is awoke within me ! ” 

Either in clasping her hands again, or in an ecstasy 
of pious joy, Miss Miggs clinked her pattens after the 
manner of a pair of cymbals, at this juncture ; and then 
resumed, in the softest accents : — 

“ And did my missis think — ho goodness, did she 
think — as her own Miggs, which supported her under 
so many trials, and understood her natur’ when them as 
intended well but acted rough, went so deep into her 
feelings — did she think as her own Miggs would ever 
leave her? Did she think as Miggs, though she was 
but a servant, and knowed that servitudes was no inheri- 
Uinces, would forgit that she was the humble instruments 
as always made it comfortable between them two when 
they fell out, and always told master of the meekness 
and forgiveness of her blessed dispositions ! Did she 
think as Miggs had no attachments 1 Did she think 
that wages was her only object ! ” 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


283 


To none of these interrogatories, whereof every one 
was more pathetically delivered than the last, did Mrs. 
Varden answer one word : but Miggs, not at all abashed 
by this circumstance, turned to the small boy in attend- 
ance — her eldest nephew — son of her own married 
sister — born in Golden Lion Court, number twenty- 
sivin, and bred in the very shadow of the second bell 
handle on the right hand door-post — and with a plenti- 
ful use of her pocket handkerchief, addressed herself to 
him ; requesting that on his return home he would con- 
sole his parents for the loss of her, his aunt, by deliver- 
ing to them a faithful statement of his having left her in 
the bosom of that family, with which, as his aforesaid 
parents w^ell knew, her best affections were incorporated ; 
that he would remind them that nothing less than her 
imperious sense of duty, and devoted attachment to her 
old master and missis, likewise Miss Dolly and young 
Mr. Joe, should ever have induced her to decline that 
pressing invitation which they, his parents, had, as he 
could testify, given her, to lodge and board with them, 
free of all cost and charge, for evermore ; lastly, that he 
would help her with her box up-stairs, and then repair 
straight home, bearing her blessing and her strong in- 
junctions to mingle in his prayers a supplication that he 
might in course of time grow up a locksmith, or a Mr. 
Joe, and have Mrs. Vardens, and Miss Dollys for his 
relations and friends. 

Having brought this admonition to an end — upon 
which, to say the truth, the young gentleman for w^hose 
benefit it was designed, bestowed little or no heed, hav- 
ing to all appearance his faculties absorbed in the con- 
templation of the sweetmeats, — Miss Miggs signified to 
the company in general that they were not to be uneasy, 


284 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


for she would soon return ; and, with her nephew^s aid, 
prepared to bear her Avardrobe up the staircase. 

“ My dear,” said the locksmith to his wife. “ Do you 
desire this ? ” 

“ I desire it ! ” she answered. “ I am astonished — I 
am amazed — at her audacity. Let her leave the house 
this moment.” 

Miggs hearing this, let her end of the box fall heavily 
to the floor, gave a very loud sniff, crossed her arms, 
screwed down the corners of her mouth, and cried, in 
an ascending scale, “ Ho, good gracious ! ” three distinct 
times. 

‘‘ You hear what your mistress says, my love,” re- 
marked the locksmith. “ You had better go, I think. 
Stay ; take this with you, for the sake of old service.” 

Miss Miggs clutched the bank-note he took from his 
pocket-book and held out to her ; deposited it in a small 
red leather purse ; put the purse in her pocket (display- 
ing as she did so, a considerable portion of some under 
garment, made of flannel, and more black cotton stock- 
ing than is commonly seen in public) ; and, tossing her 
head, as she looked at Mrs. Varden, repeated — 

“ Ho, good gracious ! ” 

“ I think you said that once before, my dear,” ob- 
served the locksmith. 

“ Times is changed, is they, mim ! ” cried Miggs, 
bridling ; “ you can spare me now, can you ? You can 
keep ’em down without me? You’re not in wants of 
nny one to scold, or throw the blame upon, no longer, 
a’n’t you, mim ? I’m glad to find you’ve grown so inde- 
pendent. I wish you joy, I’m sure ! ” 

With that she dropped a courtesy, and keeping her 
head erect, her ear towards Mrs. Varden, and her eye 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


285 


on the rest of the company, as she alluded to them in 
her remarks, proceeded : 

“ I’m quite delighted, I’m sure, to find sich indepen- 
dency, feeling sorry though, at the same time, mim, that 
you should have been forced into submissions when you 
couldn’t help yourself — he, he, he ! It must be great 
vexations, ’specially considering how ill you always 
spoke of Mr. Joe — to have him for a son-in-law at 
last; and I wonder Miss Dolly can put up with him 
either, after being off and on for so many years with a 
coach-maker. But I have hecrd say, that the coach- 
maker thought twice about it — he, he, he ! — and 
that he told a young man as was a friend of his, 
that he hoped he knowed better than to be drawed 
into that ; though she and all the family did pull un- 
common strong ! ” 

Here she paused for a reply, and receiving none, went 
on as before. 

“ I have heerd say, mini, that the illness of some ladies 
was all pretensions, and that they could faint away, stone 
dead, whenever they had the inclinations so to do. Of 
course I never see sich cases with my own eyes — ho 
no ! He, he, he ! Nor master neither — ho no ! He, 
he, he ! I have heerd the neighbors make remark as 
some one as they was acquainted with, was a poor good- 
natur’d mean-spirited creetur, as went out fishing for a 
wife one day, and caught a Tartar. Of course I never 
to my knowledge see the poor person himself. Nor did 
you neither, mim — ho no. I wonder who it can be — 
don’t you, mini ? No doubt you do, mim. Ho yes. 
He, he, he!” 

Again Miggs paused for a reply ; and none being 
offered, was so oppressed with teeming spite and spleen, 
that she seemed like to burst. 


286 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


Pm glad Miss Dolly can laugh,” cried Miggs with a 
feeble titter. “ I like to see folks a-laughing — so do 
you, mim, don’t you ? You was always glad to see 
people in spirits, wasn’t you, mim ? And you always 
did your best to keep ’em cheerful, didn’t you, mim ? 
Though there a’n’t such a great deal to laugh at now, 
either ; is there, mim ? It a’n’t so much of a catch, after 
looking out so sharp ever since she was a little chit, and 
costing such a deal in dress and show, to get a poor 
common soldier, with one arm, is it, mim ? He he ! I 
wouldn’t have a husband with one arm, anyways. I 
would have two arms. I would have two arms, if it 
was me, though instead of hands they’d only got hooks 
at the end, like our dustman ! ” 

Miss Miggs was about to add, and had, indeed, begun 
to add, that, taking them in the abstract, dustmen were 
far more eligible matches than soldiers, though, to be 
sure, when people were past choosing they must take 
the best they could get, and think themselves well oflf 
too; but her vexation and chagrin being of that inter- 
nally bitter sort which finds no relief in words, and is 
aggravated to madness by want of contradiction, she 
could hold out no longer, and burst into a storm of 
sobs and tears. 

In this extremity she fell on the unlucky nephew, 
tooth and nail, and plucking a handful of hair from his 
head, demanded to 'know how long she was to stand there 
to be insulted, and whether or no he meant to help her 
to carry out the box again, and if he took a pleasure in 
hearing his family reviled : with other inquiries of that 
nature ; at which disgrace and provocation, the small 
boy, who had been all this time gradually lashed into 
rebellion by the sight of unattainable pastry, walked off 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


287 


indignant, leaving his aunt and the box to follow at their 
leisure. Somehow or other, by dint of pushing and pull- 
ing, they did attain the street at last ; where Miss Miggs, 
all blowzed with the exertion of getting there, and with 
her sobs and tears, sat down upon her property to rest 
and grieve, until she could ensnare some other youth t 
help her home. 

“It’s a thing to laugh at, Martha, not to care for,” 
whispered the locksmith, as he followed his wife to the 
window, and good-humoredly dried her eyes. “ What 
does it matter ? You had seen your fault before. 
Come ! Bring up Toby again, my dear ; Dolly shall 
sing us a song ; and we’ll be all the merrier for this 
interruption I ” 


288 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


CHAPTER LXXXI. ^ 

.5 

Another month had passed, and the end of August 
had nearly come, when Mr. Haredale stood alone in 
the mail-coach office at Bristol. Although but a few 
weeks had intervened since his conversation with Ed- 
ward Chester and his niece in the locksmith’s house, and 
he had made no change, in the mean time, in his 
accustomed style of dress, his appearance was greatly 
altered. He looked much older, and more careworn. 
Agitation and anxiety of mind scatter wrinkles and 
gray hairs with no unsparing hand ; but deeper traces 
follow on the silent uprooting of old habits, and sever-- 
ing of dear, familiar ties. The affections may not be 
so easily wounded as the passions, but their hurts are 
deeper, and more lasting. He was now a solitary man, 
and the heart within him was dreary and lonesome. 

He was not the less alone for having spent so many 
years in seclusion and retirement. This was no better 
preparation than a round of social cheerfulness : per- 
haps it even increased the keenness of his sensibility. 
He had been so dependent upon her for companion- 
ship and love ; she had come to be so much a part and 
parcel of his existence ; they had had so many cares and 
thoughts in common, which no one else had shared; 
that losing her was beginning life anew, and being re- 
quired to summon up the hope and elasticity of youth, 
amid the doubts, distrusts, and weakened energies of age. 


BARNABY RUDGE 


289 


The effort he had made to part fi*om her with seem- 
ing cheerfulness and hope — and they had parted only 
yesterday — left him the more depressed. With these 
feelings, he was about to revisit London for the last time, 
and look once more upon the walls of their old home, 
before turning his back upon it, forever. 

The journey was a very different one, in those days, 
from w’hat the present generation find it ; but it came to 
an end, as the longest journey will, and he stood again 
in the streets of the metropolis. He lay at the inn 
where the coach stopped, and resolved, before he went 
to bed, that he would make his arrival known to no one ; 
would spend but another night in London; and would 
spare himself the pang of parting, even with the honest 
locksmith. 

Such conditions of the mind as that to which he was 
a prey when he lay down to rest, are favorable to the 
growth of disordered fancies, and uneasy visions. He 
knew this, even in the horror with which he started from 
his first sleep, and threw up the window to dispel it by 
the presence of some object, beyond the room, which had 
not been, as it were, the witness of his dream. But it 
was not a new terror of the night ; it had been present 
to him before, in many shapes ; it had haunted him in 
bygone times, and visited his pillow again and again. 
If it had been but an ugly object, a childish spectre, 
haunting his sleep, its return, in its old form, might have 
awakened a momentary sensation of fear, which, almost 
in the act of waking, would have passed away. This 
disquiet, however, lingered about him, and would yield 
to nothing. When he closed his eyes again, he felt it 
hovering near ; as he slowly sunk into a slumber, he 
was conscious of its gathering strength and purpose, and 

VOL. in 19 


290 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


gradually assuming its recent shape ; when he sprung 
up from his bed, the same phantom vanished from his 
heated brain, and left him filled with a dread, against 
which reason and waking thought were powerless. 

The sun was up, before he could shake it off. He 
rose late, but not refreshed, and remained wdthin doors 
all that day. He had a fancy for paying his last visit 
to the old spot in the evening, for he had been accus- 
tomed to walk there at that season, and desired to see 
it under the aspect that was most familiar to him. At 
such an hour as would afford him time to reach it a 
little before sunset, he left the inn, and turned into the 
busy street. 

He had not gone far, and was thoughtfully making his 
way among the noisy crowd, when he felt a hand upon 
his shoulder, and turning, recognized one of the waiters 
from the inn, who begged his pardon, but he had left his 
sword behind him. 

“ Why have you brought it to me ? ” he asked, stretch- 
ing out his hand, and yet not taking it from the man, 
but looking at him in a disturbed and agitated manner. 

The man was sorry to have disobliged him, and would 
carry it back again. The gentleman had said that he 
was going a little way into the country, and that he 
might not return until late. The roads were not very 
safe for single travellers after dark ; and since the riots, 
gentlemen had been more careful than ever not to trust 
themselves unarmed in lonely places. “We thought you 
were a stranger, sir,” he added, “ and that you might 
believe our roads to be better than they are ; but per 
haps you know them well and carry fire-arms ” — 

He took the sword, and putting it up at his side, 
thanked the man, and resumed his walk. 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


291 


It was long remembered that he did this in a mjm- 
ner so strange, and with such a trembling hand, that 
the messenger stood looking after his retreating figure, 
doubtful whether he ought not to follow, and watch him. 
It was long remembered that he had been heard pac- 
ing his bedroom in the dead of the night ; that the 
attendants had mentioned to each other in the morning, 
how fevered and how pale he looked ; and that when 
this man went back to the inn, he told a fellow-servant 
that what he had observed in this short interview lay 
very heavy on his mind, and that he feared the gentle- 
man intended to destroy himself, and would never come 
back alive. 

With a half consciousness that his manner had at- 
tracted the man’s attention (remembering the expression 
of his face when they parted), Mr. Haredale quickened 
his steps ; and arriving at a stand of coaches, bargained 
with the driver of the best to carry him so far on his 
road as the point where the footway struck across the 
fields, and to await his return at a house of entertain- 
ment which was within a stone’s-throw of that place. 
Arriving there in due course, he alighted and pursued 
his way on foot. 

He passed so near the Maypole, that he could see its ‘ 
smoke rising from among the trees, while a flock of 
pigeons — some of its old inhabitants, doubtless — sailed 
gayly home to roost, between him and the unclouded sky 
“ The old house will brighten up now,” he said, as he 
looked towards it, “ and there will be a merry fireside 
beneath its ivied roof. It is some comfort to know that 
everything will not be blighted hereabouts. I shall be 
glad to have one picture of life and cheerfulness to turn 
io, in my mind ! ” 


292 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


He resumed his walk, and bent his steps towards the 
Warren. It was a clear, calm, silent evening, with 
hardly a breath of wind to stir the leaves, or any sound 
to break the stillness of the time, but drowsy sheep-bells 
tinkling in the distance, and, at intervals, the far-oflP 
lowing of cattle, or bark of village-dogs. The sky was 
radiant with the softened glory of sunset ; and on the 
earth, and in the air, a deep repose prevailed. At such 
an hour he arrived at the deserted mansion which had 
been his home so long, and looked for the last time upon 
its blackened walls. 

The ashes of the commonest fire are melancholy things, 
for in them there is an image of death and ruin, — of 
something that has been bright, and is but dull, cold, 
dreary dust, — with which our nature forces us to sym- 
pathize. How much more sad the crumbled embers of 
a home ; the casting down of that great altar, where 
the worst among us sometimes perform the worship of 
the heart; and where the best have offered up such 
sacrifices, and done such deeds of heroism, as, chron- 
icled, would put the proudest temples of old Time, with 
all their vaunting annals, to the blush. 

He roused himself from a long train of meditation, 
and walked slowly round the house. It was by this 
time almost dark. 

He had nearly made the circuit of the building, when 
he uttered a half-suppressed exclamation, started, and 
stood still. Reclining, in an easy attitude, with his 
back against a tree, and contemplating the ruin with 
an expression of pleasure, — a pleasure so keen that 
it overcame his habitual indolence and command of 
feature, and displayed itself utterly free from all re- 
straint or reserve, — before him, on his Qwn ground, and 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


293 


Mumphing then, as he had triumphed in every mis- 
fortune and disappointment of his life, stood the man 
whose presence, of all mankind, in any place, and least 
of all in that, he could the least endure. 

Although his blood so rose against this man, and his 
wrath so stirred within him, that he could have struck 
him dead, he put such fierce constraint upon himself 
that he passed him without a w'ord or look. Yes, and 
he would have gone on, and not turned, though to resist 
the Devil who poured such hot temptation in his brain, 
required an effort scarcely to be achieved, if this man 
had not himself summoned hiin to stop : and that, with 
an assumed compassion in his voice which drove him 
w’ellnigh mad, and in an instant routed all the self- 
command it had been anguish — acute, poignant anguish 
— to sustain. 

All consideration, reflection, mercy, forbearance ; 
everything by which a goaded man can curb his rage 
and passion ; fled from him as he turned back. And 
yet he said, slowly and quite calmly — far more calmly 
than he had ever spoken to him before : 

“ Why have you called to me ? ” 

“ To remark,” said Sir John Chester with his wonted 
composure, “ what an odd chance it is, that we should 
meet here ! ” 

“ It is a strange chance.” 

“ Strange ? The most remarkable and singular thing 
in the world. I never ride in the evening ; I have not 
done so for years. The whim seized me, quite unac- 
countably, in the middle of last night. — How very pic- 
turesque this is ! ” — He pointed, as he spoke, to the 
ilismantled house, and raised his glass to his eye. 

You praise your own work very freely.” 


294 


BARNABY KUDGE. 


Sir John let fall his glass ; inclined his face towards 
him with an air of the most courteous inquiry ; and 
slightly shook his head as though he were remarking to 
himself, “ I fear this animal is going mad ! ” 

“ I say you praise your own work very freely,” re- 
peated Mr. Haredale. 

“ Work ! ” echoed Sir John, looking smilingly round. 
“ Mine ! — I beg your pardon, I really beg your par- 
don”— 

“ Why, you see,” said Mr. Haredale, “ those walls. 
You see those tottering gables. You see on every side 
where fire and smoke have raged. You see the destruc- 
tion that has been wanton here. Do you not ! ” 

“ My good friend,” returned the knight, gently check- 
ing his impatience with his hand, “ of course I do. I 
see everything you speak of, when you stand aside, and 
do not interpose yourself between the view and me. I 
am very sorry for you. If I had not had the pleasure 
to meet you here, I think I should have written to tell 
you so. But you don’t bear it as well as I had expected 
— excuse me — no, you don’t indeed.” 

He pulled out his snuff-box, and addressing him with 
the superior air of a man who, by reason of his higher 
nature, has a right to read a moral lesson to another, 
continued: 

“For you are a philosopher, you know — one of that 
stern and rigid school who are far above the weaknesses 
of mankind in general. You are removed, a long way, 
from the frailties of the crowd. You contemplate them 
from a height, and rail at them with a most impressive 
bitterness. I have heard you.” 

— “ And shall again,” said Mr. Haredale. 

“ Thank you,” returned the other. “ Shall we walk 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


295 


as we talk? The damp falls rather .heavily. Well, — 
as you please. But I grieve to say that I can spare you 
only a very few moments.” 

“ I would,” said Mr. Haredale, “ you had spared me 
none. I would, with all my soul, you had been in Para- 
dise (if such a monstrous lie could be enacted), rather 
than here to-night.” 

“ Nay,” returned the other — “ really — you do your- 
self injustice. You are a rough companion, but I would 
not go so far to avoid you.” 

“ Listen to me,” said Mr. Haredale. “ Listen to me.” 

“ While you rail ?” inquired Sir John. 

“ While I deliver your infamy. You urged and stim- 
ulated to do your work a fit agent, but one who in his 
nature — in the very essence of his being — is a traitor, 
and who has been false to you (despite the sympathy 
you two should have together) as he has been to all 
others. With hints, and looks, and crafty words, which 
told again are nothing, you set on Gashford to this work 

— this work before us now. With these same hints, and 
looks, and crafty words, which told again are nothing, 
you urged him on to gratify the deadly hate he owes me 

— I have earned it, I thank Heaven — by the abduction 
and dishonor of my niece. You did. I see denial in 
your looks,” he cried, abruptly pointing in his face, and 
stepping back, “ and denial is a lie ! ” 

He had his hand upon his sword ; but the knight, with 
Q contemptuous smile, replied to him as coldly as before. 

“You will take notice, sir — if you can discriminate 
suiriciently — that I have taken the trouble to deny 
nothing. Your discernment is hardly fine enough for 
the perusal of faces, not of a kind as coarse as your 
speech ; nor has it ever been, that I remember ; or, in 


296 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


one face that I could name, you would have read indif- 
ference, not to say disgust, somewhat sooner than you 
did. I speak of a long time ago, — but you understand 
me.” 

“ Disguise it as you will, you mean denial. Denial 
explicit or reserved, expressed or left to be inferred, is 
Btill a lie. You say you don’t deny. Do you admit ? ” 

“ You yourself,” returned Sir John, suffering the cur- 
rent of his speech to flow as smoothly as if it had been 
stemmed by no one word of interruption, “ publicly pro- 
claimed the character of the gentleman in question (I 
think it was in Westminster Hall) in terms which relieve 
me from the necessity of making any further allusion to 
him. You may have been warranted ; you may not 
have been ; I can’t say. Assuming the gentleman to be 
what you described, and to have made to you or any 
other person any statements that may have happened to 
suggest themselves to him, for the sake of his own se- 
curity, or for the sake of money, or for his own amuse- 
ment, or for any other consideration, — I have nothing 
to say of him, except that his extremely degrading situ- 
ation appears to me to be shared with his employers. 
You are so very plain yourself that you will excuse a 
little freedom in me, I am sure.” 

“ Attend to me again. Sir John — but once,” cried Mr. 
Haredale ; “ in your every look, and word, and gesture, 
you tell me this was not your act. I tell you that it 
was, and that you tampered with the man I speak of, 
and with your wretched son (whom God forgive !) to do 
this deed. You talk of degradation and character. You 
told me once that you had purchased the absence of the 
poor idiot and his mother, when (as I have discovered 
since, and then suspected) you had gone to tempt them, 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


297 


and had found them flown. To you I traced the insinu- 
ation that I alone reaped any harvest from my brother’s 
death ; and all the foul attacks and whispered calumnies 
that followed in its train. In every action of my life, 
from that first hope which you converted into grief and 
desolation, you have stood, like an adverse fate, between 
me -and peace. In all, you have ever been the. same 
cold-blooded, hollow, false, unworthy villain. For the 
second time, and for the last, I cast these charges in your 
teeth, and spurn you from me as I would a faithless 
dog!” 

With that, he raised his arm, and struck him on the 
breast so that he staggered. Sir John, the instant he 
recovered, drew his sword, threw away the scabbard and 
his hat, and running on his adversary, made a desperate 
lunge at his heart, which, but that his guard was quick 
and true, would have stretched him dead upon the grass. 

In the act of striking him, the torrent of his oppo- 
nent’s rage had reached a stop. He parried his rapid 
thrusts, without returning them, and called to him, with 
a frantic kind of terror in his face, to keep back. 

“ Not to-night ! not to-night ! ” he cried. “ In God’s 
name, not to-night ! ” 

Seeing that he lowered his weapqn, and that he would 
not thrust in turn. Sir John lowered his. 

“ Not to-night ! ” his adversary cried. “ Be warned 
n time !” 

“ You told me — it must have been in a sort of inspi- 
ration ” — said Sir John, quite deliberately, though now 
he dropped his mask, and showed his hatred in his face, 

‘ that this was the last time. Be assured it is ! Did 
»”ou believe our last meeting was forgotten ? Did you 
oelieve that your eve?*y word and look was not to be ac- 


298 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


counted for, and was not well remembered ? Do you 
believe that I have waited your time, or you mine ? 
What kind of man is he who entered, with all his sick- 
ening cant of honesty and truth, into a bond with me to 
prevent a marriage he affected to dislike, and when I 
^ad redeemed my part to the spirit and the lettei-, 
fkulked from his, and brought the match about in- his 
dwn time, to rid himself of a burden he had grown tired 
of, and cast a spurious lustre on his house ? ” 

I have acted,” cried Mr. Haredale, “ with honor and 
in good faith. I do so now. Do not force me to renew 
this duel to-night ! ” 

“ You said my ‘ wretched ’ son, I think ? ” said Sir 
John, with a smile. “ Poor fool ! The dupe of such a 
shallow knave — trapped into marriage by such an un- 
cle and by such a niece — he well deserves your pity. 
But he is no longer a son of mine : you are welcome to 
the prize your craft has made, sir.” 

“ Once more,” cried his opponent, wildly stamping on 
the ground, “ although you tear me from my better an- 
gel, I implore you not to come within the reach of my 
sword to-night. Oh ! why were you here at all ! Why 
have we met ! To-morrow would have cast us far apart 
forever ! ” . 

“ Tnat being the case,” returned Sir John, without the 
least emotion, “ it is very fortunate we have met to-night, 
Haredaie, 1 have always despised you, as you know, but 
I have given you credit for a species of brute courage. 
For the honor of my judgment, which I had thought a 
good one, 1 am sorry to find you a coward.” 

Not another word was spoken on either side. They 
pressed swords, itiough it was now quite dusk, and at- 
tacked each oihci fieicely. They were well matched, 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


299 


and each was thoroughly skilled in the management of 
his weapon. 

After a few seconds they grew hotter and more furi- 
ous, and pressing on each other inflicted and received 
several slight wounds. It w'as directly after receiving 
one of these in his arm, that Mr. Haredale, making a 
keener thrust as he felt the warm blood spirting out, 
plunged his sword through his opponent’s body to the 
hilt. 

Their eyes met, and were on each other as he drew it 
out. He put his arm about the dying man, who re- 
pulsed him, feebly, and dropped upon the turf. Raising 
himself upon his hands, he gazed at him for an instant, 
with scorn and hatred in his look ; but, seeming to re- 
member, even then, that this expression would distort 
his features after death, he tried to smile, and, faintly 
moving his right hand, as if to hide his bloody linen in 
his vest, fell back dead — the phantom of last night. 


' 'i 


800 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


CHAPTER THE LAST. 

A PARTING glance at such of the actors in this little 
history as it has not, in the course of its events, dis- 
missed, will bring it to an end. 

Mr. Haredale fled that night. Before pursuit could 
be begun, indeed before Sir John was traced or missed, 
he had left the kingdom. Repairing straight to a re- 
ligious establishment, known throughout Europe for the 
rigor and severity of its discipline, and for the merciless 
penitence it exacted from those who sought its shelter as 
B refuge from the world, he took the vows which thence- 
forth shut him out from nature and his kind, and after a 
few remorseful years was buried in its gloomy cloisters. 

Two days elapsed before the body of Sir John was 
found. As 'soon as it was recognized and carried home, 
the faithful valet, true to his master’s creed, eloped with 
all the cash and movables he could lay his hands on, and 
started as a finished gentleman upon his own account. 
In this career he met with great success, and would cer- 
tainly have married an heiress in the end, but for an 
unlucky check which led to his premature decease. He 
sank under a contagious disorder, very prevalent at that 
time, and vulgarly termed the jail fever. 

Lord. George Gordon, remaining in his prison in the 
Tower until Monday the fifth of Febniary in the follow- 
ing year, was on that day solemnly tried at Westminster 
for High Treason. Of this crime he was, after a patient 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


301 


investigation, declared Not Guilty ; upon the ground that 
there was no proof of his having called the multitude 
together with any traitorous or unlawful intentions. Yet 
60 many people were there, still, to whom those riots 
taught no lesson of reproof or moderation, that a public 
subscription was set on foot in Scotland to defray the 
cost of his defence. 

For seven years afterwards he remained, at the strong 
intercession of his friends, comparatively quiet ; saving 
that he, every now and then, took occasion to display his 
Beal for the Protestant faith in some extravagant pro- 
ceeding which was the delight of its enemies ; and sav- 
ing, besides, that he was formally excommunicated by 
the Archbishop of Canterbury, for refusing to appear as 
a witness in the Ecclesiastical Court when cited for that 
purpose. In the year 1788 he was stimulated by some 
new insanity to write and publish an injurious pamphlet, 
reflecting on the Queen of France, in very violent terms. 
Being indicted for the libel, and (after various strange 
demonstrations in court) found guilty, he fled into Hol- 
land in place of appearing to receive sentence: from 
whence, as the quiet burgomasters of Amsterdam had no 
relish for his company, he was sent home again with all 
speed. Arriving in the month of July at Harwich, and 
going thence to Birmingham, he made, in the latter 
place, in August, a public profession of the Jewish re- 
ligion ; and figured there as a Jew until he was ar- 
rested, and brought back to London to receive the sen- 
tence he had evaded. By virtue of this sentence he was, 
in the month of December, cast into Newgate for five 
years and ten months, and required besides to pay a 
large fine, and to furnish heavy securities for his future 
good behavior. 


802 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


After addressing, in the midsummer of the following 
year, an appeal to the commiseration of the National As- 
sembly of France, which the English minister refused to 
sanction, he composed himself to undergo his full term 
of punishment ; and suffering his beard to grow nearly 
to his waist, and conforming in all respects to the cere- 
monies of his new religion, lie applied himself to the 
study of history, and occasionally to the art of painting, 
in which, in his younger days, he had shown some skill. 
Deserted by his former friends, and treated in all re- 
spects like the worst criminal in the jail, he lingered on, 
quite cheerful and resigned, until the 1st of November, 
1793, when he died in his cell, being then only three- 
and-forty years of age. 

Many men with fewer sympathies for the distressed 
and needy, with less abilities and harder hearts, have 
made a shining figure and left a brilliant fame. He had 
his mourners. The prisoners bemoaned his loss, and 
missed him ; for though his means were not large his 
charity was great, and in bestowing alms among them 
he considered the necessities of all alike, and knew no 
distinction of sect or creed. There are wise men in the 
highways of the world who may learn something, even 
from this poor crazy lord who died in Newgate. 

To the last, he was truly served by bluff John Grueby 
John was at his side before he had been four-aiul-twentj 
hours in the Tower, and never left him until he died. 
He had one other constant attendant, in the person of a 
beautiful Jewish girl ; who attached herself to him from 
feelings half religious, half romantic, but whose virtuous 
and disinterested character appears to have been beyond 
the censure even of the most censorious. 

Gashford deserted him, of course. He subsisted for a 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


a08 

time upon his traffic in his master’s secrets ; and, this 
trade failing when the stock was quite exhausted, pro- 
cured an appointment in the honorable corps of spies 
and eaves-droppers employed by the government. As 
one of these wretched underlings, he did his drudgery, 
sometimes abroad, sometimes at home, and long endured 
the various miseries of such a station. Ten or a dozen 
years ago — not more — a meagre, wan old man, dis- 
eased and miserably poor, was found dead in his bed 
at an obscure inn in the Borough, where he was quite 
unknown. He had taken poison. There was no clew 
to his name ; but it was discovered from certain entries 
in a pocket-book he carried, that he had been secre- 
tary to Lord George Gordon in the time of the famous 
riots. 

Many months after the reestablishment of peace and or- 
der, and even when it had ceased to be the town talk, that 
every military officer, kept at free quarters by the city 
during the late alarms, had cost for his board and lodg- 
ing four pounds four per day, and every private soldier 
two and twopence half-penny ; many months after even 
this engrossing topic was forgotten, and the United Bull- 
Dogs were to a man all killed, imprisoned or transported, 
Mr. Simon Tappertit, being removed from a hospital to 
prison, and thence to his place of trial, was discharged 
by proclamation, on two wooden legs. Sliorn of his 
graceful limbs, and brought down from his high estate 
to circumstances of utter destitution, and the deepest 
misery, he made shift to stump back to his old master, 
and beg for some relief. By the locksmitlfs advice and 
aid, he was established in business as a shoe-black, and 
opened shop under an archway near the Horse Guards, 
This being a central quarter, he quickly made a very 


304 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


large connection ; and on levee days, was sometimes 
known to have as many as twenty half-pay officers wait- 
ing their turn for polishing. Indeed his trade increased 
to that extent, that in course of time he entertained no 
less than two apprentices, besides taking for his wife the 
widow of an eminent bone and rag-collector, formerly of 
Millbank. With this lady (who assisted in the business) 
he lived in great domestic happiness, only checkered by 
those little storms which serve to clear the atmosphere 
of wedlock, and brighten its horizon. In some of these 
gusts of bad weather, Mr. Tappertit would, in the asser- 
tion of his prerogative, so far forget himself as to correct 
his lady with a brush, or boot, or shoe ; while she (but 
only in extreme cases) would retaliate by taking off his 
legs, and leaving him exposed to the derision of those 
urchins who delight in mischief. 

Miss Miggs, baffled in all her schemes, matrimonial 
and otherwise, and cast upon a thankless, undeserving 
world, turned very sharp and sour ; and did at length 
become so acid, and did so pinch and slap and tweak the 
hair and noses of the youth of Golden Lion Court, that 
she was by one consent expelled that sanctuary, and de- 
sired to bless some other spot of earth, in preference. It 
chanced at that moment, that the justices of the peace for 
Middlesex proclaimed by public placard that they stood 
in need of a female turnkey for the County Bridewell, 
and appointed a day and hour for the inspection of 
candidates. Miss Miggs, attending at the time appointed, 
was instantly chosen and selected from one hundred and 
iwenty-four competitors, and at once promoted to the 
office which she held until her decease, more than 
thirty years afterwards, remaining single all that time. 
It was observed of this lady that while she was inflexi- 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


305 


ble and grim to all her female flock, she was particularly 
so to those who could establish any claim to beauty ; and 
it was often remarked as a proof of her indomitable 
virtue and severe chastity, that to such as had been frail 
she showed no mercy ; always falling upon them on the 
slightest occasion, or on no occasion at all, with the 
fullest measure of her wrath. Among other useful in- 
ventions which she practised upon this class of oifenders 
and bequeathed to posterity, was the art of inflicting an 
exquisitely vicious poke or dig with the wards of a key 
in the small of the back, near the spine. She likewise 
originated a mode of treading by accident (in pattens) on 
such as had small' feet ; also very remarkable for its in- 
genuity, and previously quite unknown. 

It was not very long, you may be sure, before Joe 
Willet and Dolly Varden were made husband and wife, 
and with a handsome sum in bank (for the locksmith 
could afford to give his daughter . a good dowry), re- 
opened the Maypole. It was not very long, you may 
be sure, before a red-faced little boy was seen staggering 
about the Maypole passage, and kicking up his heels on 
the green before the door. It was not very long, count- 
ing by years, before there was a red-faced little girl, 
another red-faced little boy, and a whole troop of girls 
and boys : so that, go to Chigwell when you would, there 
would surely be seen, either in the village street, or on 
the green, or frolicking in the farm-yard — for it was a 
farm now, as well as a tavern — more small Joes and 
small Dollys than could be easily counted. It was not a 
very long time before these appearances ensued ; but it 
wai a very long time before Joe looked five years older, 
or Dolly either, or the locksmith either, or his wife 
either : for cheerfulness and content are great beauti- 
voL. III. 20 


306 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


fiers, and are famous preservers of youthful looks, de- 
pend upon it. 

It was a long time, too, before there was such a coun- 
try inn as the Maypole, in all England ; indeed it is a 
great question whetlier there has ever been such another 
to this hour, or ever \yill be. It was a long time too — 
for Never, as the proverb says, is a long day — before 
they forgot to have an interest in wounded soldiers at the 
Maypole ; or before Joe omitted to refresh them, for the 
sake of his old campaign ; or before the sergeant left off 
looking in there, now and then ; or before they fatigued 
themselves, or each other, by talking on these occasions 
of battles and sieges, and hard weather and hard service, 
and a thousand things belonging to a soldier’s life. As 
\o the great silver snuff-box which the King sent Joe 
vith his own hand, because of his conduct in the Riots, 
vhat guest ever went to the Maypole without putting 
^nger and thumb into that box, and taking a great pinch, 
tliough he had never taken a pinch of snuff before, and 
almost sneezed himself into convulsions even then ? As 
to the purple-faced vintner, where is the man who lived 
in those times and never saw him at the Maypole : to all 
appearance as much at home in the best room, as if he 
lived there ? And as to the feastings and christenings 
and revellings at Christmas, and celebrations of birth- 
days, wedding-days, and all manner of days, both at the 
Maypole and the Golden Key, — if they are not notori- 
ous, what facts are ? 

Mr. Willet the elder, having been by some extraor- 
dinary means possessed with the idea that Joe wanted to 
be married, and that it would be well for him, his father, 
to retire into private life, and enable him to live in com- 
fort, took up his abode in a small cottage at Chigwell ; 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


307 


where they widened and enlarged the fire-place for hiin^ 
hung up the boiler, and furthermore planted in the little 
garden outside the front-door, a fictitious Maypole : so 
that he was quite at home directly. To this his new 
habitation, Tom Cobb, Phil Parkes, and Solomon Daisy 
went regularly every night ; and in the chimney-corner, 
they all four quaffed, and smoked, and prosed, and dozed, 
as they had done of old. It being accidentally dis- 
covered after a short time that Mr. Willet still appeared 
tc consider himself a landlord by profession, Joe pro- 
vided him with a slate, upon which the old man regu- 
larly scored up vast accounts for meat, drink, and 
tobacco. As he grew older this passion increased upon 
him ; and it became his delight to chalk against the name 
of each of his cronies a sum of enormous magnitude, and 
impossible to be paid : and such was his secret joy in 
these entrif^'s, that liP would lio norpetually seen going 
behind the door to look at them, and corning Ibrtb again, 
suffused with the liveliest satisfaction. 

He never recovered the sui'prise the Rioters had given 
him, and remained in the same mental condition down to 
the last moment of his life. It was like to have been 
brought to a speedy termination by the first sight of his 
first grandchild, which appeared to fill him with the 
belief that some alarming miracle had happened to Joe. 
Being promptly blooded, however, by a skilful surgeon, 
he rallied ; and although the doctors all agreed, on his 
being attacked with symptoms of apoplexy six months 
afterwards, that he ought to die, and took it very ill that 
he did not, he remained alive — possibly on account 
of his constitutional slowness — for nearly seven years 
more, when he was one morning found speechless in his 
bed. He lay in this state, free from all tokens of un- 


308 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


easiness, for a whole week, when he was suddenly re- 
stored to consciousness by hearing the nurse whisper 
in his -son’s ear that he was going. “ Fin a-going, 
Joseph,” said Mr. Willet, turning round upon the in- 
stant, “ to the Salwanners ” — and immediat(dy gave 
up the ghost. 

He left a large sum of money behind him ; even more 
than he was supposed to have been worth, althougli the 
neighbors, according to the custom of mankind in calcu- 
lating the wealth that other people ought to have saved, 
had estimated his property in good round numbers. Joe 
inherited the whole ; so that he became a man of great 
consequence in those parts, and was perfectly indepen- 
dent. 

Some time elapsed before Barnaby got the better of 
tlie shock he had sustained, or regained his old heiilth 
and gayety. But he recovered by degrees : and altiiough 
he could never separate his condemnation and escape 
from the idea of a terrific dream, he became, in other 
respects, more rational. Dating from the time of his 
recovery, he had a better memory and greater steadiness 
of purpose ; but a dark cloud overhung his whole previ- 
ous existence, and never cleared away. 

He was not the less happy for this ; for his love of 
freedom and interest in all that moved or grew, or had 
its being in the elements, remained to liim unimpaired. 
He lived with his mother on the Maypole farm, tending 
the j)Oultry and the cattle, woiking in a garden of his 
own, and helping everywhere. He was known to every 
bird and beast about the place, and had a name? for every 
one. Nevrn- was there a lighter-hearted husbandman, a 
creature moi-e ’popular with young and old, a blither or 
more happy soul than Barnaby ; and though he was free 


BAP.^JABY BUDGE. 


309 


to ramble where he would, he never quitted Her, but 
was for evermore her stay and comfort. 

It was remarkable that although he had that dim sense 
of the past, he sought out Hugh’s dog, and took him 
under his care ; and that he never could be tempted into 
London. When the Riots were many years old, and 
Edward and his wife came back to England with a 
family almost as numerous as Dolly’s, and one day ap- 
peared at the Maypole porch, he knew them instantly, 
and wept and leaped for joy. But neither to visit them, 
nor on any other pretence, no matter how full of promise 
and enjoyment, could he be persuaded to set foot in the 
streets: nor did he ever conquer his repugnance or look 
upon the town again. 

Grip soon recovered his looks, and became as glossy 
and sleek as ever. But he was profoundly silent. 
Whether he had forgotten tne art of Polite Conversation 
in Newgate, or had made a vow in those troubled times 
to forego, for a period, the display of his accomplishments, 
is matter of uncertainty ; but certain it is that for u 
whole year he never indulged in any other sound than 
a grave, decorous croak. At the expiration of that term 
the morning being very bright and sunny, he was heard 
to address himself to the horses in the stable, upon the 
subject of the Kettle, so often mentioned in these pages ; 
and before the witness who overheard him could run into 
the house with the intelligence, and add to it upon his 
solemn affirmation the statement that he had heard him 
laugh, the bird himself advanced with fantastic steps 
to the very door of the bar, and there cried “ I’m a 
devil. I’m a devil, I'm a devil ! ” with extraordinary 
rapture. 

From that period f although he was supposed to be 


310 


BARNABY RUDGE. 


much affected by the death of Mr. Willet senior), he 
constantly practised and improved himself in the vulgar 
tongue ; and as he was a mere infant for a raven when 
Barnaby was gray, he has very probably gone on talk- 
ing to the present time. 


THE END. 













SKETCHES BY BOZ, 


ILLUSTRATIVE OF 


liVERY-DAY LIFE AND EVERY-DAY PEOPLE 


VOLUME II. 


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SKETCHES BY BOZ 


CHARACTERS. 

(CONTINUED.) 


CHAPTER IX. 

THE DANCING ACADEMY. 

Of all the dancing academies that ever were estab* 
lished, there never was one more popular in its immedi- 
ate vicinity than Signor Billsmethi’s, of the “ King’s 
Theatre.” It was not in Spring Gardens, or Newman 
Street, or Berners Street, or Gower Street, or Charlotte 
Street, or Percy Street, or any other of the numerous 
streets which have been devoted time out of mind to 
professional people, dispensaries, and boarding-houses; 
it was not in the West End at all — it rather approxi- 
mated to the eastern portion of London, being situated 
in the populous and improving neighborhood of Gray’s 
Inn Lane. It was not a dear dancing academy — four- 
and-sixpence a quarter is decidedly cheap upon the 
whole. It was very select, the number of pupils being 
strictly limited to seventy-five, and a quarter’s payment 
in advance being rigidly exacted. There was public 
tuition and private tuition — an assembly-room and a 
parlor. Signor Bellsmethi’s family were always thrown 
in with the parlor, and included in parlor price ; that is 
to say, a private pupil had Signor Billsinetbi’s parlor to 


B 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


dance in^ and Signor Billsmethi’s family to dance with, ; 
and when he had been sufficiently broken in in the parlor, 
he began to run in couples in the Assembly-room. 

Such was the dancing academy of Signor Billsmethi, 
when Mr. Augustus Cooper, of Fetter Lane, first saw 
an unstamped advertisement walking leisurely down Hol- 
born Hill, announcing to the world that Signor Bill- 
smethi, of the King’s Theatre, intended opening for the 
season with a Grand Ball. 

Now, Mr. Augustus Cooper was in the oil and color 
line — just of age, with a little money, a little business, 
and a little mother, who having managed her husband 
and his business in his lifetime took to managing her son 
and his business after his decease ; and so, somehow or 
other, he had been cooped up in the little back-parlo) 
behifid the shop on week days, and in a little deal bo3 
without a lid (called by courtesy a pew) at Bethel 
Chapel, on Sundays, and had seen no more of the world 
than if he had been an infant all his days ; wherear 
Young White, at the Gas-fitter’s over the way, three 
years younger than him, had been flaring away like 
winkin’ — going to the theatre — supping at harmonic 
meetings — eating oyster’s by the barrel — drinking stout 
by the gallon — even stopping out all .night, and coming 
home as cool in the morning as if nothing had happened- 
So Mr. Augustus Cooper made up his mind that h*. 
would not stand it any longer, and had that very morn- 
ing expressed to his mother a firm determination to bo 
‘‘ blowed,” in the event of his not being instantly pro* 
vided with a street-door key. And he was walking down 
Holborn Hill, thinking about all these things, and won- 
dering how he could manage to get introduced into gen- 
teel society for the first time, when his eyes rested on 


THE DANCING ACADEMY. 


9 


Signor Billsmethi’s announcement, which it immediately 
struck him was just the very thing he wanted ; for he 
should not only be able to select a genteel circle of ac- 
quaintance at once, out of the five-and-seventy pupils at 
four-and-sixpence a quarter, but should qualify himself 
at the same time to go through a hornpipe in private 
society, with perfect ease to himself, and great delight to 
his friends. So, he stopped the unstamped advertise- 
ment — an animated sandwich, composed of a boy be- 
tween two boards — and having procured a very small 
card with the Signor’s address indented thereon, walked 
straight at once to the Signor’s house — and very fast he 
walked too, for fear the list should be filled up, and the 
five-and-seventy completed, before he got there. The 
Signor was at home, and, what was still more gratifying, 
he was an Englishman ! Such a nice man — and so 
polite ! The list was not full, but it was a most extraor- 
dinary circumstance that there was only just one va- 
cancy, and even that one would have been filled up, that 
very morning, only Signor Billsmethi was dissatisfied 
with the reference, and, being very much afraid that the 
lady wasn’t select, wouldn’t take her. 

“ And very much delighted I am, Mr. Cooper,” said 
Signor Billsmethi, “ that I did not take her. I assure 
you, Mr. Cooper — I don’t say it to flatter you, for I 
know you’re above it — that I consider myself extremely 
fortunate in having a gentleman of your manneis and 
appearance, sir.” 

“ I am very glad of it too, sir,” said Augustus Cooper. 

“ And I hope we shall be better acquainted, sir,” said 
Signor Billsmethi. 

“ And I’m sure I hope we shall too, sir,” responded 
Augustus Cooper. Just then, the door opened, and in 


10 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


came a young lady, with her hair curled in a crop all 
over her head, and her shoes tied in sandals all over her 
ankles. 

“ Don’t run away, my dear,” said Signor Billsmethi ; 
for the young lady didn’t know Mr. Cooper was there 
when she ran in, and was going to run out again in her 
modesty, all in confusion-like. “ Don’t run away, my 
dear,” said Signor Billsmethi, “ this is Mr. Cooper — 
Mr. Cooper, of Fetter Lane. Mr. Cooper, my daughter, 
sir — Miss Billsmethi, sir, who I hope will have the 
pleasure of dancing many a quadrille, minuet, gavotte, 
country-dance, fandango, double hornpipe, and farinaghol- 
kajingo with you, sir. She dances them all, sir ; and so 
shall you, sir, before you’re a quarter older, sir.” 

And Signor Billsmethi slapped Mr. Augustus Cooper 
on the back, as if he had known him a dozen years, — 
so friendly ; — and Mr. Cooper bowed to the young lady, 
and the young lady courtesied to him, and Signor Bill- 
smethi said they were as handsome a pair as ever he’d 
wish to see ; upon which the young lady exclaimed, 
“ Lor, pa ! ” and blushed as red as Mr. Cooper himself 
— you might have thought they were both standing 
under a red lamp at a chemist’s shop ; and before Mr. 
Cooper went away it was settled that he should join the 
family circle that very night — taking them just as they 
were — no ceremony nor nonsense of that kind — and 
learn his positions, in order that he might lose no time, 
and be able to come out at the forthcoming ball. 

Well ; Mr. Augustus Cooper went away to one of the 
cheap shoemakers’ shops in Holborn, where gentlemen’s 
dress-pumps are seven-and-sixpence, and men’s strong 
walking just nothing at all, and bought a pair of the 
regular seven-and-sixpenny, long-quartered town-mades. 


THE DANCING ACADEMY. 


11 


in which he astonished himself quite as much as his 
mother, and sallied forth to Signor Billsmethi’s. There 
were four other private pupils in the parlor: two ladies and 
two gentlemen. Such nice people ! Not a bit of pride 
about them. One of the ladies in particular, who was in 
training for a Columbine, was remarkably affable ; and 
she and Miss Billsmethi took such an interest in Mr. 
Augustus Cooper, and joked and smiled, and looked so 
bewitching, that he got quite at home, and learnt his 
steps in no time. After the practising was over. Signor 
Billsmethi, and Miss Billsmethi, and Master Billsmethi, 
and a young lady, and the two ladies, and the two gen- 
tlemen, danced a quadrille — none of your slipping and 
sliding about, but regular warm work, flying into cor- 
ners, and diving among chairs, and shooting out at the 
door, — something like dancing ! Signor Billsmethi in 
particular, notwithstanding his having a little fiddle to 
play all the time, was out on the landing every figure, and 
Master Billsmethi, when everybody else was breathless, 
danced a hornpipe, with a cane in his hand, and a cheese- 
plate on his head, to the unqualified admiration of the 
whole company. Then, Signor Billsmethi insisted as 
they were so happy, that they should all stay to supper, 
and proposed sending Master Billsmethi for the beer and 
spirits, whereupon the two gentlemen swore, “ strike ’em 
wulgar if they’d stand that;” and were just going to 
quarrel who should pay for it, when Mr. Augustus 
Cooper said he would, if they’d have the kindness tc 
allow him — and they had the kindness to allow him ; 
and Master Billsmethi brought the beer in a can, and 
the rum in a quart-pot. They had a regular night of it ; 
and Miss Billsmethi squeezed Mr. Augustus Cooper’s 
hand under the table ; and Mr. Augustus Cooper re- 


12 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


turned the squeeze and returned home too, at something 
to six o’clock in the morning, when he was put to bed 
by main force by the apprentice, after repeatedly express- 
ing an uncontrollable desire to pitch his revered parent 
out of the second-floor window, and to throttle the ap- 
prentice with his own neck-handkerchief. 

Weeks had worn on, and the seven-and-sixpenny town- 
mades had nearly woni out, when the night arrived for 
the grand dress-ball at which the whole of the five-and- 
seventy pupils were to meet together, for the first time 
that season, and to take out some portion of their re- 
spective four-and-sixpences in lamp-oil and fiddlers. Mr. 
Augustus Cooper had ordered a new coat for the occa- 
sion — a two-pound-tenner from Turnstile. It was his 
first appearance in public ; and, after a grand Sicilian 
shawl-dance by fourteen young ladies in character, he 
was to open the quadrille department with Miss Bill- 
smethi herself, with whom he had become quite intimate 
since his first introduction. It was a night ! Everything 
was admirably arranged. The sandwich-boy took the 
hats and bonnets at the street-door ; there was a tum-up 
bedstead in the back parlor, on which Miss Billsmethi 
made tea and coffee for such of the gentlemen as chose 
to pay for it, and such of the ladies as the gentlemen 
treated ; red port-wine negus and lemonade were handed 
round at eighteen-pence a head ; and in pursuance of a 
previous engagement with the public-house at the corner 
of the street, an extra pot-boy was laid on for the occa- 
sion. In short, nothing could exceed the arrangements, 
except the company. Such ladies ! Such pink silk 
stockings ! Such artificial flowers ! Such a number of 
cabs ! No sooner had one cab set down a couple of ladies, 
than another cab drove up and set down another couple of 


THE DANCING ACADEMY. 


IS 


ladies, and they all knew : not only one another, but the 
majority of the gentlemen into the bargain, which made 
it all as pleasant and lively as could be. Signor Bill- 
smethi, in black tights, with a large blue bow in his 
buttonhole, introduced the ladies to such of the gentle- 
men as were strangers : and the ladies talked away ■— 
and laughed they did — it was delightful to see them. 

As to the shawl-dance, it was the most exciting thing 
that ever was beheld ; there was such a whisking, and 
rustling, and fanning, and getting ladies into a tangle 
with artificial flowers, and then disentangling them again ! 
And as to Mr. Augustus Cooper’s share in the quadrille, 
he got through it admirably. He was missing from his 
partner, now and then, certainly, and discovered on such 
occasions to be either dancing with laudable perseverance 
in another set, or sliding about in perspective, without 
any definite object ; but generally speaking, they man- 
aged to shove him through the figure, until he turned up 
in the right place. Be this as it may, when he had 
finished, a great many ladies and gentlemen came up 
and complimented him very much, and said they had 
never seen a beginner do anything like it before ; and 
Mr. Augustus Cooper was perfectly satisfied with him- 
self, and everybody else into the bargain ; and “ stood ” 
considerable quantities of spirits-and-water, negus, and 
compounds, for the use and behoof of two or three dozen 
very particular friends, selected from the select circle of 
five-and-seventy pupils. 

Now, whether it was the strength of the compounds. 
Dr the beauty of the ladies, or what not, it did so happen 
that Mr. Augustus Cooper encouraged, rather than re- 
pelled, the very flattering attentions of a young lady in 
brown gauze over white calico who had appeared partic- 


14 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


ularly struck witli him from the first ; and when the en- 
couragements had been prolonged for some time, Miss 
Billsmethi betrayed her spite and jealousy thereat by 
calling the young lady in brown gauze a “ creeter,” 
which induced the young lady in brown gauze to retort, 
in certain sentences containing a taunt founded on the 
payment of four-and-sixpence a quarter, which reference 
Mr. Augustus Cooper, being then and there in a state of 
considerable bewilderment, expressed his entire concur- 
rence in. Miss Billsmethi, thus renounced, forthwith 
began screaming in the loudest key of her voice, at the 
rate of fourteen screams a minute ; and being unsuccess- 
ful, in an onslaught on the eyes and face, first of the lady 
in gauze and then of Mr. Augustus Cooper, called dis- 
tractedly on the other three-and-seventy pupils to furnish 
her with oxalic acid for her own private drinking ; and, 
the call not being honored, made another rush at Mr. 
Cooper, and then had her stay-lace cut, and was carried 
off to bed. Mr. Augustus Cooper, not being remarkable 
for quickness of apprehension, was at a loss to under- 
stand what all this meant, until Signor Billsmethi ex- 
plained it in a most satisfactory manner, by stating to 
the pupils that Mr. Augustus Cooper had made and 
confirmed divers promises of marriage to his daughtei 
on divers occasions, and had now basely deserted her ; 
on which, the indignation of the pupils became universal 
and as several chivalrous gentlemen inquired rathei 
pressingly of Mr. Augustus Cooper, whether he required 
anything for his own use, or, in other words, whether he 
‘‘ wanted anything for himself,” he deemed it prudent to 
make a precipitate retreat. And the upshot of the 
matter was, that a lawyer’s letter came next day, and an 
action was commenced next week ; and that Mr, Augiia- 


SHABBY-GENTEEL PEOPLE. 


15 


tu8 Cooper, after walking twice to the Serpentine for the 
purpose of drowning himself, and coming twice back 
without doing it, made a confidante of his mother, who 
compromised the matter with twenty pounds from the 
till : which made twenty pounds four shillings and six- 
pence paid to Signor Billsmethi, exclusive of treats and 
pumps. And Mr. Augustus Cooper went back and lived 
with his mother, and there he lives to this day ; and as 
he has lost his ambition for society, and never goes into 
the world, he will never see this account of himself, and 
will never be any the wiser. 


CHAPTER X. 

SHABBY-GENTEEL PEOPLE* 

There are certain descriptions of people who, oddly 
enough, appear to appertain exclusively to the metropolis. 
You meet them, every day, in the streets of London, but 
no one ever encounters them elsewhere ; they seem indig- 
enous to the soil, and to belong as exclusively to London 
as its own smoke, or the dingy bricks and mortar. We 
could illustrate the remark by a variety of examples, 
but, in our present sketch, we will only advert to one 
class as a specimen — that class which is so aptly and 
expressively designated as “ shabby-genteel.” 

Now, shabby people, God knows, may be found any- 
where, and genteel people are not articles of greater 
scarcity out of London than in it ; but this compound 
of the two — this shabby-gentility — is as purely local 


16 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


as the statue at Charing Cross, or the pump at Aldgate. 
It is worthy of remark, too, that only men are shabby- 
genteel ; a woman is always either dirty and slovenly in 
the extreme, or neat and respectable^ however poverty- 
stricken in appearance. A very poor man, “who has 
seen better days,” as the phrase goes, is a strange com- 
pound of dirty slovenliness and wretched attempts at 
faded smartness. 

We will endeavor to explain our conception of the 
term which forms the title of this paper. If you meet 
a man, lounging up Drury Lane, or leaning with his 
back against a post in Long Acre, with his hands in the 
pockets of a pair of drab trousers plentifully besprinkled 
with grease-spots : the trousers made very full over the 
boots, and ornamented with two cords down the outside 
of each leg — wearing, also, what has been a brown coat 
with bright buttons, and a hat very much pinched up at 
the sides, cocked over his right eye — don’t pity him. 
He is not shabby-genteel. The “ harmonic meetings ” at 
some fourth-rate public-house, or the purlieus of a private 
theatre, are his chosen haunts ; he entertains a rooted 
antipathy to any kind of work, and is on familiar terms 
with several pantomime men at the large houses. But, 
if you see hurrying along a by-street, keeping as close 
as he can to the area-railings, a man of about forty or 
fifty, clad in an old rusty suit of threadbare black cloth 
which shines with constant wear as if it had been bees- 
waxed — the trousers tightly strapped down, partly for 
the look of the thing and partly to, keep his old shoes 
from slipping off at the heels, — if you observe, too, that 
his yellowish-white neckerchief is carefully pinned up, 
to conceal the tattered garment underneath, and that his 
hands are encased in the remnants of an old pair of 


SHABBY-GENTEEL PEOPLE. 


17 


beaver gloves, you may set him down as a shabby-gen- 
teel man. A glance at that depressed face, and timorous 
air of conscious poverty, will make your heart ache — 
always supposing that you are neither a philosopher nor 
a political economist. 

We were once haunted by a shabby-genteel man ; he 
was bodily present to our senses all day, and he was in 
our mind’s eye all night. The man of whom Sir Walter 
Scott speaks in his Demonology, did not suffer half the 
persecution from his imaginary gentleman-usher in black 
velvet, that we sustained from our friend in quondam 
black cloth. - He first attracted our notice by sitting 
opposite to us in the reading-room of the British Mu- 
seum ; and what made the man more remarkable was, 
that he always had before him a couple of shabby-gen- 
teel books — two old dogs-eared folios, in mouldy worm- 
eaten covers, which had once been smart. He was in 
his chair, every morning, just as the clock struck ten ; 
he was always the last to leave the room in the after- 
noon ; and when he did, he quitted it with the air of a 
man who knew not where else to go, for warmth and 
quiet. There he used to sit all day, as close to the table 
as possible, in order to conceal the lack of buttons on 
his coat : with his old hat carefully deposited at his feet, 
where he evidently flattered himself it escaped observa- 
tion. • 

About two o’clock, you would see him munching a 
French roll or a penny loaf ; not taking it boldly out of 
his pocket at once^ like a man who knew he was only 
making a lunch ; but breaking off little bits in his pocket, 
and eating them by stealth. He knew too w^ell it was 
bis dinner. 

When we first ‘»aw this poor object, we thought it 

l ji *1. 2 


18 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


quite impossible that his attire could ever become worse. 
We even went so far, as to speculate on the possibility 
of his shortly appearing in a decent second-hand suit. 
We knew nothing about the matter ; he grew more and 
more shabby-genteel every day. The buttons dropped 
off his waistcoat one by one ; then, he buttoned his coat ; 
and when one side of his coat was reduced to the same 
condition as the waistcoat, he buttoned it over on the other 
side. He looked somewhat better at the beginning of 
the week than at the conclusion, because the neckerchief, 
though yellow, was not quite so dingy ; and, in the midst 
of all this wretchedness, he never appeared without 
gloves and straps. He remained in this state for a week 
or two. At length, one of the buttons on the back of 
the coat fell off, and then the man himself disappeared, 
and we thought he was dead. 

We were sitting at the same table about a week after 
his disappearance, and as our eyes rested on his vacant 
chair, we insensibly fell into a train of meditation on the 
subject of his retirement from public life. We were 
wondering whether he had hung himself, or thrown him- 
self off a bridge — whether he really was dead or had 
only been arrested — when our conjectures were sud- 
denly set at rest by the entry of the man himself. He 
had undergone some strange metamorphosis, and walked 
up the centre of the room with an air which showed 
he was fully conscious of the improvement in his appear- 
ance. It was very odd. His clothes were a fine, deep, 
glossy black ; and yet they looked like the same suit ; 
nay, there were tlie very darns with wdiich old acquaint- 
ance had made us familiar. The hat, too — nobody 
could mistake the shape of that hat, with its high crown 
gradually increasing in circumference towards the top. 


SHABBY-GENTEEL PEOPLE. 


19 


Long service had imparted to it a reddish-brown tint ; 
but, now, it was as black as the coat. The truth flashed 
suddenly upon us — they had been “ revived.” It is a 
deceitful liquid that black and blue reviver ; we have 
watched its effects on many a shabby-genteel man. It 
betrays its victims into a temporary assumption of im- 
portance: possibly into the purchase of a new pair of 
gloves, or a cheap stock, or some other trifling article of 
dress. It elevates their spirits for a week, only to de- 
press them, if possible, below their original level. It was 
BO in this case ; the transient dignity of the unhappy 
man decreased, in exact proportion as the “ reviver ” 
wore off. The knees of the unmentionables, and the 
elbows of the coat, and the seams generally, soon began 
to get alarmingly white. The hat was once more depos- 
ited under the table, and its owner crept into his seat as 
quietly as ever. 

There was a week of incessant small rain and mist. 
At its expiration the “ reviver ” had entirely vanished, 
and the shabby-genteel man never afterwards attempted 
to effect any improvement in his outward appearance. 

It would be difficult to name any particular part of 
town as the principal resort of shabby-genteel men. 
We have met a great many persons of this description in 
the neighborhood of the inns of court. They may be 
met with, in Holborn, between eight and ten any morn- 
ing ; and whoever has the curiosity to enter the Insolvent 
Debtors’ Court will observe, both among spectators and 
practitioners, a great variety of them. We never went 
on ’Change, by any chance, without seeing some shabby- 
genteel men, and we have often wondered what earthly 
business they can have there. They wall sit there, for 
hours, leaning on great' dropsical, mildewed umbrellas, or 


20 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


eating Abemethy biscuits. Nobody speaks to them, nor 
they to any one. On consideration, we remember to have 
occasionally seen two shabby-genteel men conversing to- 
gether on ’Change, but our experience assures us that 
this is an uncommon circumstance, occasioned by the 
offer of a pinch of snuff, or some such civility. 

It would be a task of equal difficulty, either to assign 
any particular spot for the residence of these beings, or 
to endeavor to enumerate their general occupations. 
We were never engaged in business with more than one 
shabby-genteel man ; and he was a drunken engraver, 
and lived in a damp back-parlor in a new row of houses 
at Camden Town, half street, half brick-field, somewhere 
near the canal. A shabby-genteel man may have no oc- 
cupation, or he may be a corn agent, or a coal agent, or a 
wine agent, or a collector of debts, or a broker’s assist- 
ant, or a broken-down attorney. He may be a clerk of 
the lowest description, or a contributor to the press of 
the same grade. Whether our readers have noticed 
these men, in their walks, as often as we have, we know 
not ; this we know — that the miserably poor man (no 
matter whether he owes his distresses to his own con- 
duct, or that of others) who feels his poverty and vainly 
strives to conceal it, is one of the most pitiable objects in 
human nature. Such objects, with few exceptions, are 
shabby-genteel people. 


MAKING A NIGHT OF IT 


21 


CHAPTER XL- 

MAKING A NIGHT OF IT. 

Damon and Pythias were undoubtedly very good 
fellows in their way : the former for his extreme readi- 
ness to put in special bail for a friend : and the latter for 
a certain trump-like punctuality in turning up just in the 
very nick of time, scarcely less remarkable. Many 
points in their character have, however, grown obsolete. 
Damons are rather hard to find, in these days of impris- 
onment for debt (except the sham ones, and they cost 
half-a-crown) ; and, as to the Pythiases, the few that 
have existed in these degenerate times, have had an 
unfortunate knack of making themselves scarce, at the 
very moment when their appearance would have been 
strictly classical. If the actions of these heroes, how- 
ever, can find no parallel in modern times, their friend- 
ship can. We have Damon and Pythias on the one 
hand. We have Potter and Smithers on the other; 
and, lest the two last-mentioned names should never 
have reached the ears of our unenlightened readers, we 
can do no better than make them acquainted with the 
owners thereof. 

Mr. Thomas Potter, then, was a clerk in the city, and 
Mr. Robert Smithers was a ditto in the same ; their in- 
comes were limited, but their friendship was unbounded. 
They lived in the same street, walked into town every 
morning at the same hour, dined at the same slap-bang 
every day, and revelled in each other’s company every 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


night. They were knit together by the closest ties of 
intimacy and friendship, or, as Mr. Thomas Potter touch- 
ingly observed, they “ were thick-and-thin pals, and noth- 
ing »but it.” There was a spice of romance in Mr. 
Smithers’s disposition, a ray of poetry, a gleam of misery, 
a sort of consciousness of he didn’t exactly know what, 
coming across him he didn’t precisely know why — 
which stood out in fine relief against the off-hand, 
dashing, amateur-pickpocket-sort-of-manner, which dis- 
tinguished Mr. Potter in an eminent degree. 

‘ The peculiarity of their respective dispositions, ex- 
tended itself to their individual costume. JVIr. Smithers 
generally appeared in public in a surtout and shoes, with 
a narrow black neckerchief and a brown hat, very much 
turned up at the sides — peculiarities w’^hich Mr. Potter 
wholly eschewed, for it was his ambition to do something 
in the celebrated “ kiddy ” or stage-coach way, and he 
had even gone so far as to invest capital in the purchase 
of a rough blue coat with wooden buttons, made upon 
the fireman’s principle, in which, with the addition of a 
low-crowned, flower-pot-saucer-shaped hat, he had created 
no inconsiderable sensation at the Albion in Little Russell 
Street, and divers other places of public and fashionable 
resort. ‘ 

Mr. Potter and Mr. Smithers had mutually agreed 
that, on the receipt of their quarter’s salary, they would 
jointly and in company “ spend the evening ” — an evi- 
dent misnomer — the spending applying, as everybody 
knows, not to the evening itself but to all the money the 
individual may chance to be possessed of, on the occasion 
to which reference is made ; and they had likewise 
agreed that, on the evening aforesaid, they would “ make 
a night of it ” — an expressive term, implying the bor- 


MAKING A NIGHT OF IT. 


23 


rowing of several hours from to-morrow morning, adding 
them to the night before, and manufacturing a compound 
night of the whole. 

The quarter-day arrived at last — we say at last, be- 
cause quarter-days are as eccentric as comets : moving 
wonderfully quick when you have a good deal to pay, 
and marvellously slow when you have a little to receive. 
Mr. Thomas Potter and Mr. Robert Smithers met by 
appointment to begin the evening with a dinner ; and a 
nice, snug, comfortable dinner they had, consisting of a 
little procession of four chops and four kidneys, following 
each other, supported on either side by a pot of the real 
draught stout, and attended by divers cushions of bread, 
and wedges of cheese. 

When the cloth was removed, Mr. Thomas Potter or- 
dered the waiter to bring in two goes of his best Scotch 
whiskey, with warm water and sugar, and a couple of his 
“ very mildest ” Havannahs, which the waiter did. Mr. 
Thomas Potter mixed his grog, and lighted his cigar ; 
Mr. Robert Smithers did the same ; and then, Mr. 
Thomas Potter jocularly proposed as the first toast, 
“ the abolition of all offices whatever ” (not sinecures, 
but counting-houses), which was immediately drunk by 
Mr. Robert Smithers with enthusiastic applause. So 
they went on, talking politics, puffing cigars and sip- 
ping whiskey-and-water, until the “ goes ” — most ap- 
propriately so called — were both gone, which Mr. 
Robert Smithers perceiving, immediately ordered in two 
more goes of the best Scotch whiskey, and two more of 
the very mildest Havannahs ; and the goes kept coming 
in, and the mild Havannahs kept going out, until, what 
with the drinking, and lighting, and puffing, and the stale 
ashes on the table, and the tallow-grease on the cigars. 


24 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


Mr. Robert Smithers began to doubt the mildness of the 
Havannahs, and to feel very much as if he had been sit- 
ting in a hackney-coach with his back to the horses. 

As to ]VIr. Thomas Potter, he would keep laughing 
out loud, and volunteering inarticulate declarations that 
he was “ all right ; ” in proof of which he feebly bespoke 
the evening paper after the next gentleman, but finding 
it a matter of some difficulty to discover any news in its 
columns, or to ascertain distinctly whether it had any 
columns at all, walked slowly out to look for the moon, 
and, after coming back quite pale with looking up at the 
sky so long, and attempting to express mirth at Mr. 
Robert Smithers having fallen asleep, by various gal- 
vanic chuckles, laid his head on his arm, and went to 
sleep also. When he awoke again, Mr. Robert Smithers 
awoke too, and they both very gravely agreed that it was 
extremely unwise to eat so many pickled walnuts with 
the chops, as it was a notorious fact that they always 
made people queer and sleepy ; indeed, if it had not 
been for the whiskey and cigars, there was no knowing 
what harm they mightn’t have done ’em. So they took 
some coffee, and after paying the bill, — twelve and two- 
pence the dinner, and the odd tenpence for the waiter — 
thirteen shillings in all — started out on their expedition 
to manufacture a night. 

It was just half-past eight, so they thought they 
couldn’t do better than go at half-price to the slips at 
the City Theatre, which they did accordingly. Mr. 
Robert Smithers, who had become extremely poetical 
after the settlement of the bill, enlivening the walk by 
informing Mr. Thomas Potter in confidence that he felt 
an inward presentiment of approaching dissolution, and 
iubsequently embellishing the theatre, by falling asleep, 


MAKING A NIGHT OF IT. 25 

witli his head and both arms gracefully drooping over 
the front of the boxes. 

Such was the quiet demeanor of the unassuming 
Smithers, and such were the happy effects of Scotch 
whiskey and Havannahs on that interesting person ! 
But Mr. Thomas Potter, whose great aim it was to be 
considered as a “ knowing card,” a “ fast-goer,” and so 
forth, conducted himself in a very different manner, and 
commenced going very fast indeed — rather too fast at 
last, for the patience of the audience to keep pace with 
him. On his first entry, he contented himself by ear- 
nestly calling upon the gentlemen in the gallery to “ flare 
up,” accompanying the demand with another request, 
expressive of his wish that they would instantaneously 
“ form a union,” both which requisitions were responded 
to, in the manner most in vogue on such occasions. 

“ Give that dog a bone ! ” cried one gentleman in his 
shirt-sleeves. 

“ Where have you been a having half a pint of inter- 
mediate beer ? ” cried a second. “ Tailor ! ” screamed 
a third. “ Barber’s clerk ! ” shouted a fourth. “ Throw 
him o — VER ! ” roared a fifth ; while numerous voices 
concurred in desiring Mr. Thomas Potter to “ go home 
to his mother ! ” All these taunts Mr. Thomas Potter re- 
ceived with supreme contempt, cocking the low-crowned 
hat a little more on one side, whenever any reference 
was made to his personal appearance, and, standing up 
with his arms a-kimbo, expressing defiance melodra- 
matically. 

The overture — to which these various sounds had 
been an ad libitum accompaniment — concluded, the 
second piece began, and Mr. Thomas Potter, emboldened 
by impunity, proceeded to behave in a most unprece- 


26 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


dented and outrageous manner. First, of all, he imitated 
the shake of the principal female singer ; then, groaned 
at the blue fire ; then, affected to be frightened into con- 
vulsions of terror at the appearance of the ghost ; and, 
lastly, not only made a running commentary, in an au- 
dible voice, upon the dialogue on the stage, but actually 
awoke ]Mi\ Robert Smithers, who, hearing his compan- 
ion making a noise, and having a very indistinct notion 
where he was, or what was required of him, immediately, 
by way of imitating a good example, set up the most 
unearthly, unremitting, and appalling howling that ever 
audience heard. It was too much. “ Turn them out ! ” 
was the general cry. A noise, as of shuffling of feet, 
and men being knocked up with violence against wain- 
scoting, was heard : a hurried dialogue of “ Come out ? ” 
— “I won’t ! ” — “ You shall ! ” — “I shan’t ! ” — Give 
me your card, sir ! ” — “ You’re a scoundrel, sir ! ” and 
so forth succeeded. A round of applause betokened the 
appj’obation of the audience, and Mr. Robert Smithers 
and Mr. Thomas Potter found themselves shot with 
astonishing swiftness into the road, without having had 
the trouble of once putting foot to ground during the 
whole progress of their rapid descent. 

Mr. Robert Smithers, being constitutionally one of the 
slow-goers, and having had quite enough of fast-going, in 
the course of his recent expulsion, to last until the quar- 
ter-day then next ensuing at the very least, had no sooner 
emerged with his companion from the precincts of Millou 
Street, than he proceeded to indulge in circuitous refer- 
ences to the beauties of sleep, mingled with distant allu- 
sions to the propriety of returning to Islington, and testing 
the influence of their patent Bramahs over the strecr- 
ioor locks to which they respectively belonged. IVlr. 


MAKING A NIGHT OF IT. 


27 


Thomas Potter, however, was valorous and peremptory. 
They had come out to make a night of it : and a night 
must be made. So Mr. Robert Sinithers, who was three 
parts dull, and the other dismal, despairingly assented; 
and they weni into a wine-vaults, to get materials for 
assisting them in making a night ; where they found a 
good many young ladies, and various old gentlemen, and 
a plentiful sprinkling of hackney-coachmen and cab- 
drivers, all drinking and talking together ; and Mr. 
Thomas Potter and Mi’. Robert Smithers drank small 
glasses of brandy, and large glasses of soda, until they 
began to have a very confused idea, either of things in 
general, or of anything in particular ; and, when they 
had done treating themselves they began to treat every- 
body else ; and the rest of the entertainment was a con- 
fused mixture of heads and heels, black eyes and blue 
uniforms, mud and gas-lights, thick doors, and stone 
paving. 

Then, as standard novelists expressively inform us — 
“ all was a blank ! ” and in the morning the blank was 
filled up with the words “ Station-House,” and the 
station-house was filled up with Mr. Thomas Potter, Mr. 
Robert Smithers, and the major part of their wine-vault 
companions of the preceding night, with a comparatively 
small portion of clothing of any kind. And it was 
disclosed at the Police-office, to the indignation of the 
Bench*, and the astonishment of the spectators, how one 
Robert Smithers, aided and abetted by one Thomas 
Potter, had knocked down and beaten, in divers streets, 
at different times, five men, four boys, and three women ; 
how the said Thomas Potter had feloniously obtained 
possession of five door-knockers, two bell-handles, and a 
bonnet ; how Robert Smithers, his friend, had sworn, at 


2S 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


least forty pounds’ M^ortli of oaths, at the rate of five 
shillings a-piece ; terrified whole streets full of Her 
Majesty’s subjects with awful shrieks and alarms of fire ; 
destroyed the uniforms of five policemen ; and committed 
various other atrocities, too numerous to recapitulate. 
And the magistrate, after an appropriate reprimand, 
fined Mr. Thomas Potter and Mr. Robert Smithers five 
shillings each, for being, what the law vulgarly terms, 
drunk ; and thirty -four pounds for seventeen assaults 
at forty shillings a head, with liberty to speak to the 
prosecutors. 

The prosecutors were spoken to, and INIesIfers. Potter 
and Smithers lived on credit, for a quarter, as best they 
might ; and, although the prosecutors expressed their 
readiness to be assaulted twice a week, on the same 
terms, they have never since been detected in “ making 
a night of it.” 


CHAPTER XII. 

THE prisoners’ VAN. 

We were passing the corner of Bow Street, on our 
return from a lounging excursion the other afternoon, 
when a crowd assembled round the door of the Police- 
office attracted our attention. We turned up the street 
accordingly. There were thirty or forty people, standing 
on the pavement and half across the road ; and a few 
stragglers were patiently stationed on the opposite side 
Df the way — all evidently waiting in expectation of 


THE PRISONERS’ VAN. 


29 


Kome arrival. We waited too, a few minutes, but noth- 
ing occurred ; so we turned round to an unshorn sallow- 
looking cobbler, who was standing next us with his 
hands under the bib of his apron, and put the usual 
question of “ What’s the matter ? ” The cobbler eyed 
us from head to foot, with superlative contempt, and 
laconically replied “ Nuffin.” 

Now, we were perfectly aware that if two men stop in 
the street to look at any given object, or even to gaze in 
the air, two hundred men will be assembled in no time ; 
but, as we knew very well that no crowd of people could 
by possibility remain in a street for five minutes without 
getting up a little amusement among themselves, unless 
they had some absorbing object in view, the natural 
inquiry next in order was, “ What are all these people 
waiting here for ? ” — “ Her Majesty’s carriage,” replied 
the cobbler. This was still more extraordinary. We 
could not imagine what earthly business Her Majesty’s 
carriage could have at the Public Office, Bow Street. 
We were beginning to ruminate on the possible causes 
of such an uncommon appearance, when a general ex- 
clamation from all the boys in the crowd of “ Here’s the 
wan ! ” caused us to raise our heads, and look up the 
street. 

The covered vehicle, in which prisoners are conveyed 
from the police-offices to the different prisons, was coming 
dong at full speed. It then occurred to us, for the first 
ime, that Her Majesty’s carriage was merely another 
name for the prisoner’s van, conferred upon it, not only 
by reason of the superior gentility of the term, but be- 
cause the aforesaid van is maintained at Her Majesty’s 
expense : having been originally started for the exclusive 
accommodation of ladies and gentlemen under the neces- 


30 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


Bity of visiting the various houses of call known by thft 
general denomination of “ Her Majesty’s Jails.” 

The van di’ew up at the office-door, and the people 
thronged round the steps, just leaving a little alley for 
the prisoners to pass through. Our friend the cobbler, 
and the other stragglers, crossed over, and we followed 
their example. The driver, and another man who had 
been seated by his side in front of the vehicle, dis- 
mounted, and were admitted into the office. The office- 
door was closed after them, and the crowd were on the 
tiptoe of expectation. 

After a few minutes’ delay, the door again opened, and 
the two first prisoners appeared. They were a couple 
of girls, of whom the elder could not be more than six- 
teen, and the younger of whom had certainly not attained 
her fourteenth year. That they were sisters, was evi- 
dent, from the resemblance which still subsisted between 
them, though two additional years of depravity had fixed 
their brand upon the elder girl’s features, as legibly as if 
a redhot iron had seared them. They were both gaudily 
dressed, the younger one especially ; and, although there 
was a strong similarity between them in both respects, 
which was rendered the more obvious by their being 
handcuffed together, it is impossible to conceive a greater 
contrast than the demeanor of the two presented. The 
younger girl was weeping bitterly — not for display, or 
in the hope of producing effect, but for very shame ; her 
face was buried in her handkerchief ; and her whole 
manner was but too expressive of bitter and unavailing 
sorrow. 

“ How long are you for, Emily ? ” screamed a red-faced 
woman in the crowd. “ Six weeks and labor,” replied 
be elder girl with a flaunting laugh ; “ and that’s better 


THE PKISONERS’ VAN. 


81 


Iban the stone jug anyhow ; the mill’s a deal better than 
the Sessions, and here’s Bella agoing too for the first 
time. Hold up your head, you chicken,” she continued, 
boisterously tearing the other girl’s handkerchief away ; 
“ Hold up your head, and show ’em your face, I a’n’t 
jealous, but I’m blessed if I a’n’t game ! ” — “ That’s 
right, old gal,” exclaimed a man in a paper cap, who, 
in common with the greater part of the crowd, had 
been inexpressibly delighted with this little incident. — 
“ Right ! ” replied the girl ! “ ah, to be sure ; what’s the 
odds, eh ? ” — “ Come ! In with you,” interrupted the 
driver. — “ Don’t you be in a hurry, coachman,” replied 
the girl, “ and recollect I want to be set down in Cold 
Bath Fields — large house with a high garden-wall in 
front ; you can’t mistake it. Hallo. Bella, where are 
you going to — you’ll pull my precious arm off? ” This 
was addressed to the younger girl, who, in her anxiety 
to hide herself in the caravan, had ascended the steps 
first, and forgotten the strain upon the handcuff ; “ Come 
down, and let’s show you the way.” And after jerking 
the miserable girl down with a force which made her 
stagger on the pavement, she got into the vehicle, and 
was followed by her wretched companion. 

These two girls had been thrown upon London streets, 
their vices and debauchery, by a sordid and rapacious 
mother. What the younger girl was, then, the elder had 
been once ; and what the elder then was, the younger 
must soon become. A melancholy prospect, but how 
surely to be realized ; a tragic drama, but how often 
acted ! Turn to the prisons and police offices of London 
— nay, look into the very streets themselves. These 
ffiings pass before our eyes, day after day, and hour after 
tour — they have become such matters' of course, that 


32 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


they are utterly disregarded. The progress of these 
girls in crime will be as rapid as the flight of a pes- 
tilence, resembling it too in its baneful influence and 
wide-spread infection. Step by step, how many wretched 
females, within the sphere of every man’s observation, 
have become involved in a career of vice, frightful to 
contemplate ; hopeless at its commencement, loathsome 
and repulsive in its course ; friendless, forlorn, and un- 
pitied, at its miserable conclusion ! 

There were other prisoners — boys of ten, as hardened 
in vice as men of fifty — a houseless vagrant, going joy- 
fully to prison as a place of food and shelter, handcuffed 
to a man whose prospects were ruined, character lost, 
and family rendered destitute, by his first offence. Our 
curiosity, however, was satisfied. The first group had 
left an impression on our mind we would gladly have 
avoided, and would willingly have effaced. 

The crowd dispersed ; the vehicle rolled away with its 
load of guilt and misfortune ; and we saw no more of the 
Prisoners’ Van. 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


33 


TALES. 


CHAPTER I. 

THE BOARDING-HOUSE. CHAPTER I. ' 

Mrs. Tibbs was, beyond all dispute, the most tidy, 
fidgety, thrifty, little personage that ever inhaled the 
smoke of London : and the house of Mrs. Tibbs was, 
decidedly, the neatest in all Great Coram Street. The 
area and the area steps, and the street-door, and the 
street-door steps, and the brass handle, and the door- 
plate, and the knocker, and the fan-light, were all as 
clean and bright as indefatigable whitewashing, and 
hearth-stoning, and scrubbing and rubbing could make 
them. The wonder was, that the brass door-plate, with 
the interesting inscription “ Mrs. Tibbs,” had never 
caught fire from constant friction, so perseveringly was 
it polished. There were meat-safe-looking blinds in the 
parlor-windows, blue and gold curtains in the drawing- 
room, and spring-roller blinds, as Mrs. Tibbs was wont 
in the pride of her heart to boast, “ all the way up.** 
The bell-lamp in the passage looked as clear as a soap- 
bubble ; you could see yourself in all the tables, and 
French-polish yourself on any one of the chairs. The 
banisters were beeswaxed ; and the very stain-wires 
made your eyes w'ink, they were so glittering. 

Mrs. Tibbs was somewhat short of stature, and Mr. 
3 


VOL. n. 


34 


SKETCHES BY B(JB. 


Tibbs was by no means a large man. He had moreover 
very short legs, but, by way of indemnification, his face 
was peculiarly long. He was to his wife what the 0 is in 
90 — he was of some importauco with her — he was noth- 
ing without her. Mrs. Tibbs was always talking. Mr. 
Tibbs rarely spoke ; but, if it were at any time possible 
to put in a word, when he should have said nothing at 
all, he had that talent. Mrs. Tibbs detested long stories, 
and Mr. Tibbs had one, the conclusion of which had 
never been heai’d by his most intimate friends. It 
always began, “ I recollect when I was in the volun- 
teer corps, in eighteen hundred and six,” — but, as he 
spoke very slowly and softly, and his better half very 
quickly and loudly, he rarely got beyond the introduc- 
tory sentence. He was a melancholy specimen of the 
story-teller. He was the wandering Jew of Joe Mil- 
lerism. 

Mr. Tibbs enjoyed a small independence from the 
pension-list — about 43/. 155. 10c?. a year. His father, 
mother, and five interesting scions from the same stock 
drew a like sum from the revenue of a grateful country, 
though for what particular service was never known. 
But, as this said independence was not quite sufficient 
to furnish two people with all the luxuries of this life, it 
had occurred to the busy little spouse of Tibbs, that the 
best thing she could do with a legacy of 700/., would be 
to take and furnish a tolerable house — somewhere in 
that partially explored tract of country which lies be- 
tween the British Museum, and a remote village called 
Somers* Town — for the reception of boarders. Great 
Coram Street was the spot pitched upon. The house 
had been furnished accordingly ; two female servants and 
a boy engaged ; and an advertisement inserted in the 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


85 

morning papers, informing the public that Six individ- 
uals would meet with all the comforts of a cheerful 
musical home in a select private family, residing within 
ten minutes’ Tvalk of ” — everywhere. Answers out of 
number were received, with all sorts of initials ; all the 
letters of the alphabet seemed to be seized with a sud- 
den wish to go out boarding and lodging ; voluminous 
was the correspondence between Mrs. Tibbs and the ap- 
plicants ; and most profound was the secrecy observed. 
“ E.” didn’t like this, “ I.” couldn’t think of putting up 
with that ; “ I. O. U.” didn’t think the terms would suit 
him ; and “ G. R.” had never slept in a French bed. 
The result, however, was, that three gentlemen became 
inmates of Mrs. Tibbs’s house, on terms which were 
‘‘agreeable to all parties.” In went the advertisement 
again, and a lady with her two daughters, proposed to 
increase — not their families, but Mrs. Tibbs’s. 

“ Charming woman, that Mrs. Maplesone ! ” said Mrs. 
Tibbs, as she and her spouse were sitting by the fire 
after breakfast ; the gentlemen having gone out on their 
several avocations. “ Charming woman, indeed ! ” re- 
peated little IVIrs. Tibbs, more by way of soliloquy than 
anything else, for she never thought of consulting her 
husband. “ And the two daughtei*s are delightful. We 
must have some fish to-day ; they’ll join us at dinner for 
the first time.” 

Mr. Tibbs placed the poker at right angles with the 
lire shovel, and essayed to speak, but recollected he had 
nothing to say. 

“ The young ladies,” continued Mrs. T., “ have kindly 
volunteered to bring their own piano.” 

Tibbs thought of the volunteer story, but did not ven- 
ture it. A bright thought struck him — 


36 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


‘‘ It’s very likely — ” said he. 

Pray don’t lean your head against the paper,” inter- 
rupted Mrs. Tibbs ; “ and don’t put your feet on the steel 
fender ; that’s worse.” 

Tibbs took his head from the paper, and his feet from 
the fender, and proceeded. “ It’s very likely one of the 
young ladies may set her cap at young Mr. Simpson, and 
you know a marriage — ” 

“ A what ! ” shrieked Mrs. Tibbs. Tibbs modestly re- 
peated his former suggestion. 

‘‘ I beg you won’t mention such a thing,” said Mrs. T. 
“ A marriage indeed ! — to rob me of my boarders — 
no, not for the world.” 

Tibbs thought in his own mind that the event was by 
no means unlikely; but, as he never argued with his 
wife, he put a stop to the dialogue, by observing it was 
“ time to go to business.” He always went out at ten 
o’clock in the morning, and returned at five in the after 
noon, with an exceedingly dirty face, and smelling 
mouldy. Nobody knew what he was, or where he went ; 
but Mrs. Tibbs used to say with an air of great impor- 
tance that he was engaged in the City. 

The Miss Maplesones and their accomplished parent 
arrived in the course of the afternoon in a hackney coach, 
and accompanied by a most astonishing number of pack- 
ages. Trunks, bonnet-boxes, muff-boxes, and parasols, 
guitar-cases, and parcels of all imaginable shapes, done 
up in brown paper, and fastened with pins, filled the pas- 
sage. Then, there was such a running up and down 
with the luggage, such scampering for warm water for 
the ladies to wash in, and such a bustle, and confusion, 
and heating of servants and curling-irons, as had never 
been known in Great Coram Street before. Little Mrs 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


37 


Tibbs was quite in her element, bustling about, talking 
incessantly, and distributing towels and soap like a head- 
nurse in a hospital. The house was not restored to its 
usual state of quiet repose, until the ladies were safely 
shut up in their respective bedrooms, engaged in the im^ 
portant occupation of dressing for dinner. 

Are these gals ’andsome ? ” inquired Mr. Simpson of 
Mr. Septimus Hicks, another of the boarders, as they were 
amusing themselves in the drawing-room, before dinner, 
by lolling on sofas and contemplating their pumps. 

“ Don’t know,” replied Mr. Septimus Hicks, who was 
a tallish, white-faced young man, with spectacles, and a 
black ribbon round his neck instead of a neckerchief — 
a most interesting person : a poetical walker of the hos- 
pitals, and a “ very talented young man.” He was fond 
of “ lugging ” into conversation, all sorts of quotations 
from Don Juan, without fettering himself by the pro- 
priety of their application ; in which particular he was 
remarkably independent. The other, Mr. Simpson, was 
one of those young men, who are in society what walk- 
ing gentlemen are on the stage, only infinitely worse 
skilled in his vocation than the most indifferent artist. 
He was as empty-headed as the great bell of St. Paul’s ; 
always dressed according to the caricatures published in 
the monthly fashions ; and spelt Character with a K. 

“ I saw a devilish number of parcels in the passage 
when I came home,” simpered Mr. Simpson. 

" Materials for the toilet, no doubt,” returned the Don 
Juan reader. 

“ ‘ Much linen, lace, and several pair 

Of stockings, slippers, brushes, combs, complete, 

With other articles of ladies’ fair, 

To keep them beautiful, or leave them neat.’ ” 


38 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


" Is that from Milton ? ” inquired Mr. Simpson. 

“ No — from Byron,” returned Mr. Hicks, with a look 
of contempt. He was quite sure of his author, because 
he had never read any other. “ Hush ! Here come the 
gals,” and they both commenced talking in a very loud key. 

“ Mrs. Maplesone and the Miss Maplesones, Mr. 
Hicks. Mr. Hicks — Mrs. Maplesone and the Miss 
Maplesones,” said Mi’s. Tibbs, with a very red face, for 
she had been superintending the cooking operations 
below stairs, and looked like a wax doll on a sunny day. 
“ Mr. Simpson, I beg your pardon — Mr. Simpson — 
IVIi’s. Maplesone and the Miss Maplesones” — and vice 
versa. The gentlemen immediately began to slide about 
with much politeness, and to look as if they wished their 
arms had been legs, so little did they know what to do 
Avith them. The ladies smiled, courtesied, and glided into 
chairs, and dived for dropped pocket-handkerchiefs ; the 
gentlemen leant against two of the curtain-pegs ; Mrs. 
Tibbs went through an admirable bit of serious panto- 
mime with a servant ivho had come up to ask some 
question about the fish-sauce ; and then the two young 
ladies looked at each other ; and everybody else appeared 
to discover something very attractive in the pattern of 
the fender. 

“ Julia, my love,” said Mrs. Maplesone to her young- 
est daughter, in a tone loud enough for the remainder of 
the company to hear, — “ Julia.” 

“ Yes, Ma.” 

“ Don’t stoop.” — This was said for the purpose of 
directing general attention to Miss Julia’s figure, Avhich 
was under.iable. Everybody looked at her, accordingly, 
and there was another pause. 

“We had the most uncivil hackney-coachman to-day^ 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


3S 


you can imagine,” said Mrs. Maplesone to Mrs. Tibbs, in 
a confidential tone. 

“ Dear me ! ” replied the hostess, with an air of great 
commiseration. She couldn’t say more, for the servant 
again appeared at the door, and commenced telegraphing 
most earnestly to her “ Missis.” 

“ I think hackney-coachmen generally are uncivil,’ 
said Mr. Hicks in his most insinuating tone. 

“ Positively I think they are,” replied Mrs. Maplesone, 
as if the idea had never struck her before. 

“ And cabmen, too,” said Mr. Simpson. This remark 
was a failure, for no one intimated, by word or sign, the 
slightest knowledge of the manners and customs of cab- 
men. 

“ Robinson, what do you want ? ” said Mrs. Tibbs to 
the servant, who, by way of making her presence known 
to her mistress, had been giving sundry hems and sniffs 
outside the door, during the preceding five minutes. 

“ Please, ma’am, master wants his clean tilings,” replied 
the servant, taken off her guard. The two young men 
turned their faces to the window, and “went off” like a 
couple of bottles of ginger beer; the ladies put their 
handkerchiefs to their mouths ; and little Mrs. Tibbs 
bustled out of the room to give Tibbs his clean linen, — 
and the servant warning. 

Mr. Calton, the remaining boarder, shortly afterwards 
made his appearance, and proved a surprising promoter 
of the conversation. Mr. Calton was a superannuated beau 
— an old boy. He used to say of himself that although 
his features were not regularly handsome, they were 
striking. They certainly were. It was impossible tc 
look at his face without being reminded of a chubby 
Btreet-door knocker, half-lion half-monkey ; and the com* 


40 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


parison might be extended to his whole character and 
conversation. He had stood still, while everything else 
had been moving. He never originated a conversation, 
or started an idea ; but if any commonplace topic were 
broached, or, to pursue the comparison, if anybody lifted 
him up, he would hammer away with surprising rapidity. 
He had the tic-doloreux occasionally, and then he might 
be said to be muffled, because he did not make quite as 
much noise as at other times, when he would go on pros- 
ing, rat-tat-tat the same thing over and over again. He 
had never been married ; but he was still on the look-out 
for a wife with money. He had a life-interest worth 
about 300Z. a year — he was exceedingly vain, and inor- 
dinately selfish. He had acquired the reputation of being 
the very pink of politeness, and he walked round the 
park, and up Regent Street, every day. 

This respectable personage had made up his mind to 
render himself exceedingly agreeable to Mrs. Maplesone 
— indeed, the desire of being as amiable as possible ex- 
tended itself to the whole party ; Mrs. Tibbs having 
considered it an admirable little bit of management to 
represent to the gentlemen that she had some reason to 
believe the ladies were fortunes, and to hint to the ladies, 
that all the gentlemen Avere “ eligible.” A little flirta- 
tion, she thought, might keep her house full, without 
leading to any other result. 

Mrs. Maplesone was an enterprising widow of about 
fifty : shrewd, scheming, and good-looking. She was 
amiably anxious on behalf of her daughters ; in proof 
whereof she used to remark, that she Avould have no 
objection to marry again, if it would benefit her dear 
girls — she could have no other motive. The “ dear 
girls ” themselves Avere not at all insensible to the merits 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


41 


of “ a good establishment.” One of them was twenty- 
five ; the other, three years younger. They had been at 
different watering-places, for four seasons ; they had 
gambled at libraries, read books in balconies, sold at 
fancy fairs, danced at assemblies, talked sentiment — in 
hort, they had done all that industrious girls could do — 
hut, as yet, to no purpose. 

“ What a magnificent dresser Mr. Simpson is ! ” whis- 
pered Matilda Maplesone to her sister Julia. 

“ Splendid ! ” returned the youngest. The magnificent 
individual alluded to wore a maroon-colored dress-coat, 
with a velvet collar and cuffs of the same tint — very 
like that which usually invests the fonn of the distin- 
guished unknown who condescends to play the “ swell ” 
in the pantomime at “ Richardson’s Show.” 

“ What whiskers ! ” said Miss Julia. 

“ Charming ! ” responded her sister ; “ and what hair ! ” 
His hair was like a wig, and distinguished by that insin- 
uating wave which graces the shining locks of those 
chefs~d!cbiivre of art surmounting the waxen images in 
Bartellot’s window, in Regent Street ; his whiskers meet- 
ing beneath his chin, seemed strings wherewith to tie it 
on, ere science had rendered them unnecessary by her 
patent invisible springs. 

“ Dinner’s on the table, ma’am, if you please,” said the 
boy, who now appeared for the first time, in a revived 
black coat of his master’s. 

“ Oh ! Mr. Gallon, will you lead Mrs. Maplesone ? — 
Thank you.” Mr. Simpson offered his arm to Miss 
Julia ; Mr. Septimus Hicks escorted the lovely Matilda ; 
and the procession proceeded to the dining-room. Mr. 
Tibbs was introduced, and Mr. Tibbs bobbed up and 
iown to the three ladies like a figure in a Dutch clock. 


42 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


with a powerful spring in the middle of his body, and 
then dived rapidly into his seat at the bottom of the 
table, delighted to screen himself behind a soup-tureen, 
which he could just see over, and that was all. The 
boarders were seated, a lady and gentleman alternately, 
like the layers of bread and meat in a plate of sand- 
wiches ; and then Mrs. Tibbs directed James to take off 
the covers. Salmon, lobster-sauce, giblet-soup, and the 
usual accompaniments were c?^5covered : potatoes like 
petrifactions, and bits of toasted bread, the shape and 
size of blank dice. 

‘‘ Soup for Mrs. Maplesone, my dear,” said the bustling 
Mrs. Tibbs. She always called her husband “ my dear ” 
before company. Tibbs, who had been eating his bread, 
and calculating how long it would be before he should 
get any fish, helped the soup in a hurry, made a small 
island on the tablecloth, and put his glass upon it, to hide 
it from his wife. 

“ Miss Julia, shall I assist you to some fish ? ” 

“ If you please — very little — oh ! plenty, thank 
you ” (a bit about the size of a walnut put upon the 
plate). 

“ Julia is a very little eater,” said Mrs. Maplesone to 
Mr. Calton. 

The knocker gave a single rap. He was busy eating 
the fish with his eyes : so he only ejaculated, “ Ah ! ” 

“ My dear,” said Mrs. Tibbs to her spouse after every 
one else had been helped, “ What do you take ? ” The 
inquiry was accompanied with a look intimating that he 
mustn’t say fish, because there was not much left. Tibbs 
thought the frown referred to the island on the table- 
cloth ; he therefore coolly replied, “ Why — I’ll take a 
little — fish, I think.” 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


46 


“ Did you say fish, my dear ? ” (another frown.) 

“ Yes, dear,” replied the villain, with an expression of 
acute hunger depicted in his countenance. The tears 
almost started to Mrs. Tibbs’s eyes as she helped her 
“ wretch of a husband,” as she inwardly called him, to 
the last eatable bit of salmon on the dish. 

“ James, take this to your master, and take away your 
master’s knife.” This was deliberate revenge, as Tibbs 
never could eat fish without one. He was, however, con- 
strained to chase small particles of salmon round and 
round his plate with a piece of bread and a fork, the 
number of successful attempts being about one in seven- 
teen. 

“ Take away, James,” said Mrs. Tibbs, as Tibbs swal- 
lowed the fourth mouthful — and away went the plates 
like lightning. 

“ I’ll take a bit of bread, James,” said the poor “ master 
of the house,” more hungry than ever. 

“ Never mind your master now, James,” said Mrs. 
Tibbs, “ see about the meat.” This was conveyed in the 
tone in which ladies usually give admonitions to servants 
in company, that is to say, a low one ; but which, like a 
stage whisper, from its peculiar emphasis, is most dis- 
tinctly heard by everybody present. 

A pause ensued, before the table was replenished — a 
sort of parenthesis in which Mr. Simpson, Mr. Calton, 
and Mr. Hicks, produced respectfully a bottle of sauterne, 
bucellas, and sherry, and took wine with everybody — ■ 
except Tibbs. No one ever thought of him. 

Between the fish and an intimated sirloin, there was a 
prolonged interval. 

Here was an opportunity for Mr. Hicks. He could 
uot resist the singularly appropriate quotation — 


44 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


“ But beef is rare within these oxless isles ; 

Goats’ flesh there is, no doubt, and kid, and mutton. 

And, when a holiday upon them smiles, 

A joint upon their barbarous spits they put on.” 

“ Very ungentlemanly behavior,” thought little Mrs. 
Tibbs, “ to talk in that way.” 

“ Ah,” said Mr. Calton, filling his glass. “ Tom Moore 
is my poet.” 

“ And mine,” said Mrs. Maplesone. 

‘‘ And mine,” said Miss Julia. 

“ And mine,” added Mr. Simpson. 

“ Look at his compositions,” resumed the knocker. 

“ To be sure,” said Simpson, with confidence. 

“ Look at Don Juan,” replied Mr. Septimus Hicks. 

“ Julia’s letter,” suggested Miss Matilda. 

“ Can anything be grander than the Fire Worship- 
pers ? ” inquired Miss Julia. 

“ To be sure,” said Simpson. 

“ Or Paradise and the Peri,” said the old beau. 

“ Yes ; or Paradise and the Peer,” repeated Simpson, 
who thought he was getting through it capitally. 

“ It’s all very well,” replied Mr. Septimus Hicks, who, 
as we have before liinted, never had read anything but 
Don Juan. “ Where will you find anything finer than 
the description of the siege, at the commencement of the 
seventh canto ? ” 

“ Talking of a siege,” said Tibbs, with a mouthful of 
bread — “ when I was in the volunteer corps, in eighteen 
hundred and six, our commanding officer was Sir Charles 
Rampart ; and one day, when we were exercising on the 
ground on which the London University now stands, 
ne says, says he, Tibbs (calling me from the ranks) 
Tibbs — ” 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


45 


“ Tell your master, James,” interrupted Mrs. Tibbs, in 
•m awfully distinct tone, “ tell your master if he wonH 
carve those fowls, to send them to me.” The discomfited 
volunteer instantly set to work, and carved the fowls 
almost as expeditiously as his wife operated on the haunch 
of mutton. Whether he ever finished the story is not 
known ; but, if he did, nobody heard it. 

As the ice was now broken, and the new inmates more 
at home, every member of the company felt more at 
ease. Tibbs himself most certainly did, because he went 
to sleep immediately after dinner. Mr. Hicks and the 
ladies discoursed most eloquently about poetry, and the 
theatres, and Lord Chesterfield’s Letters ; and Mr. Cal- 
ton followed up what everybody said, with continuous 
double knocks. Mrs. Tibbs highly approved of every 
observation that fell from Mrs. Maplesone ; and as Mr. 
Simpson sat with a smile upon his face and said “ Yes,” 
or “ Certainly,” at intervals of about four minutes each, 
he received full credit for understanding what was going 
forward. The gentlemen rejoined the ladies in the 
drawing-room very shortly after they had left the dining- 
parlor. Mrs. Maplesone and Mr. Calton played cribbage, 
and the “ young people ” amused themselves with music 
and conversation. The Miss Maplesones sang the most 
fascinating duets, and accompanied themselves on guitars, 
ornamented with bits of ethereal blue ribbon. Mr. Simp- 
son put on a pink waistcoat, and said he was in raptures ; 
and Mr. Hicks felt in the seventh heaven of poetry, or 
the seventh canto of Don Juan — it was the same thing 
to him. Mrs. Tibbs was quite charmed with the new 
comers ; and Mr. Tibbs spent the evening in his usual 
way — he went to sleep, and woke up, and went to sleep 
igain, and woke at supper-time. 


46 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


We are not about to adopt the license of novel-writers, 
and to let years roll on ; ” but we will take the liberty 
of requesting the reader to suppose that six months have 
elapsed, since the dinner we have described, and that 
Ml'S. Tibbs’s boarders have, during that period, sang, 
and danced, and gone to theatres and exhibitions, to- 
gether, as ladies and gentlemen, wherever they board, 
often do. And we will beg them, the period w'e have 
mentioned having elapsed, to imagine farther, that Mr. 
Septimus Hicks received, in his own bedroom (a front 
attic), at an early hour one morning, a note from Mr. 
Calton, requesting the favor of seeing him, as soon as 
convenient to himself, in his (Cal ton’s) dressing-room 
on the second floor back. 

“ Tell Mr. Calton I’ll come down directly,” said Mr. 
Septimus to the boy. “ Stop — is Mr. Calton unwell ? ” 
inquired this excited Avalker of hospitals, as he put on a 
bed-furniture-looking dressing-gown. 

“ Not as I knows on, sir,” replied the boy. “ Please, 
sir, he looked rather rum, as it might be.” 

“ Ah, that’s no proof of his being ill,” returned Hicks, 
unconsciously. “ Very well : I’ll be down directly 
Down-stairs ran the boy with the message, and down 
went the excited Hicks himself, almost as soon as the 
message was delivered. “ Tap, tap.” “ Come in.” — 
Door opens, and discovers Mr. Calton sitting in an easy- 
chair. Mutual shakes of the hand exchanged, and Mr. 
Septimus Hicks motioned to a seat. A short pause. 
Mr. Hicks coughed, and Mr. Calton took a pinch of snuflP. 
It was one of those interviews wdiere neither party knows 
what to say. Mr. Septimus Hicks broke silence. 

“ I received a note — ” he said, very tremulously in 
a voice like a Punch with a cold. 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


47 


“ Yes,” returned the other, “ you did.” 

“ Exactly.” 

“Yes.” 

Now, although this dialogue must have been satis- 
factory, both gentlemen felt there was something more 
important to be said ; therefore they did as most men in 
such a situation would have done — they looked at the 
table with a determined aspect. The conversation had 
been opened, however, and Mr. Caltoii had made up his 
mind to continue it, with a regular double knock. He 
always spoke very pompously. 

“ Hicks,” said he, “ I have sent for you, in consequence 
of certain arrangements which are pending in this house, 
connected with a marriage.” 

“ With a marriage ! ” gasped Hicks, compared with 
whose expression of countenance, Hamlet’s, when he 
sees his father’s ghost, is pleasing and composed. 

* “ With a marriage,” returned the knocker. “ I have 

sent for you to prove the great confidence I can repose 
in you.” 

“ And will you betray me ? ” eagerly inquired Hicks, 
who in his alarm had even forgotten to quote. 

“ 1 betray you / Won’t you betray me ? ” 

“ Never : no one shall know, to my dying day, that 
you liad a hand in the business,” responded the agitated 
Hicks, with an inflamed countenance, and his hair stand- 
ing on end as if he were on the stool of an electrifying 
machine in full operation. 

“ People must know that, some time or other — within 
a year, I imagine,” said Mr. Calton, with an air of great 
self-complacency, “ we may have a family.” 

“ We I — That won’t affect you, surely ? ” 

“ The devil it won’t I ” 


48 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


^ No ! how can it ? ” said the bewildered Hicks. Oal- 
ton was too much inwrapped in the contemplation of his 
happiness to see the equivoque between Hicks and him- 
self ; and threw himself back in his chair. “ Oh, Ma- 
tilda ! ” sighed the antique beau, in a lackadaisical 
^^oice, and applying his right hand a little to the left 
of the fourth button of his waistcoat, counting from the 
bottom. “ Oh, Matilda ! ” 

“ What Matilda ? ” inquired Hicks, starting up. 

“ Matilda Maplesone,” responded the other, doing the 
same. 

“ I marry her to-morrow morning,” said Hicks. 

“ It’s false,” rejoined his companion : “ I marry 

her!” 

You marry her I ” 

" I marry her ! ” 

“ You marry Matilda Maplesone ? ” 

“ Matilda Maplesone.” 

“ Miss Maplesone marry you ? ” 

“ Miss Maplesone I No : Mrs. Maplesone.” 

“ Good Heaven I ” said Hicks, falling into his chair . 
“ You marry the mother, and I the daughter ! ” 

“ Most extraordinary circumstance ! ” replied Mr. Gal- 
lon, “ and rather inconvenient too ; for the fact is, that 
owing to Matilda’s wishing to keep her intention secret 
from her daughters until the ceremony had taken place, 
she doesn’t like applying to any of her friends to give 
her away. I entertain an objection to making the affair 
knowm to my acquaintance just now ; and the conse- 
quence is, that I sent to you, to know whether you’d 
oblige me by acting as father.” 

“ I should have been most happy, I assure you,” said 
Hicks, in a tone of condolence ; “ but, you see, 1 shall be 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


49 


acting {IS bridegroom. One character is frequently a con- 
sequence of the other ; but it is not usual to act in both at 
the same time. There’s Simpson — I have no doubt 
he’ll do it for you.” 

“ I don’t like to ask him,” replied Calton ; he’s such 
a donkey.” 

Mr. Septimus Hicks looked up at the ceiling, and down 
at the floor ; at last an idea struck him. “ Let the man 
of the house, Tibbs, be the father,” he suggested ; and 
then he quoted, as peculiarly applicable to Tibbs and the 
pair — 

“ Oh Powers of Heaven ! what dark eyes meets she there ? 

’Tis — ’tis her father’s — fixed upon the pair.” 

“ The idea has struck me already,” said Mr. Calton” 
•' but, you see, Matilda, for what reason I know not, is 
very anxious that Mrs. Tibbs should know nothing about 
it, till it’s all over. It’s a natural delicacy, after all, you 
know.” 

“ He’s the best-natured little man in existence, if you 
manage him properly,” said Mr. Septimus Hicks. “ Tell 
him not to mention it to his wife, and assure him she 
won’t mind it, and he’ll do it directly. My marriage 
is to be a secret one, on account of the mother and my 
father : therefore he must be enjoined to secrecy.” 

A small double knock, like a presumptuous single one, 
was that instant heard at the street-door. It was Tibbs 
it could be no one else; for no one else occupied flve 
minutes in rubbing his shoes. He had been out to pay 
the baker’s bill. 

‘‘ Mr. Tibbs,” called Mr. Calton in a very bland tone, 
.ooking over the banisters. 

“ Sir ! ” replied he of the dirty face. 

VOL. II 4 


50 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


“ Will you have the kindness to step up-stairs for a 
moment ? ” 

“ Certainly, sir,” said Tibbs, delighted to be taken 
notice of. The bedroom-door was carefully closed, and 
Tibbs, having put his hat on the floor (as most timid 
men do), and been accommodated with a seat, looked as 
astounded as if he were suddenly summoned before the 
familiars of the Inquisition. 

“ A rather unpleasant occurrence, Mr. Tibbs,” said 
Calton, in a very portentous manner, “ obliges me to 
consult you, and to beg you will not communicate what 
I am about to say, to your wife.” 

Tibbs acquiesced, wondering in his own mind what the 
deuce the other could have done, and imagining that at 
least he must have broken the best decanters. 

Mr. Calton resumed ; “ I am placed, Mr. Tibbs, in 
rather an unpleasant situation.” 

Tibbs looked at Mr. Septimus Hicks, as if he thought 
Mr. H.’s being in the immediate vicinity of his fellow- 
boarder might constitute the unpleasantness of his situa- 
tion ; but as he did not exactly know what to say, he 
merely ejaculated the monosyllable “ Lor ! ” 

“ Now,” continued the knocker, “ let me beg you will 
exhibit no manifestations of surprise, which may be over- 
heard by the domestics, when I tell you — command 
your feelings of astonishment — that two inmates of this 
house intend to be married to-morrow morning.” And 
he drew back his chair, several feet, to perceive the effect 
of the unlooked-for announcement. 

If Tibbs had rushed from the room, staggered down- 
stairs, and fainted in the passage — if he had instan- 
taneously jumped out of the window into the mews 
behind the house, in an agony of surprise — his behavior 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


51 


vvould have been much less inexplicable to Mr. Calton 
than it was, when he put his hands into his inexpressible- 
pockets, and said with a half-chuckle, “Just so.’’ 

“ You are not surprised, Mr. Tibbs ? ” inquired Mr, 
Calton. 

“ Bless you, no, sir,” returned Tibbs ; “ after £\11 it’s 
very natural. When two young people get together, 
you know — ” 

“ Certainly, certainly,” said Calton, with an indescrib- 
able air of self-satisfaction. 

“ You don’t think it’s at all an out-of-the-way affair 
then ? ” asked Mr. Septimus Hicks, who had watched the 
countenance of Tibbs in mute astonishment. 

“ No, sir,” replied Tibbs ; “ I was just the same at his 
age.” He actually smiled when he said this. 

“ How devilish well I must carry my years ! ” thought 
the delighted old beau, knowing he was at least ten years 
older than Tibbs at that moment. 

“ Well, then, to come to the point at once,” he contin- 
ued, “ I have to ask you whether you will object to act 
as father on the occasion ? ” 

“ Certainly not,” replied Tibbs ; still without evincing 
an atom of surprise. 

“ You will not ? ” 

“ Decidedly not,” reiterated Tibbs, still as calm as a 
pot of porter with the head off. 

Mr. Calton seized the hand of the petticoat-governed 
little man, and vowed eternal friendship from that hour. 
Hicks, who was all admiration and surprise, did the 
iame. 

“Now confess,” asked Mr. Calton of Tibbs, as he 
picked up his hat, “ were you not a little surprised ? ” 

“ 1 b’lieve you ! ” replied that illustrious person, holding 


52 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


up one hand ; “ I blieve you ! When I firet heard 
of it.” 

“ So sudden,” said Septimus Hicks. 

“ So strange to ask me, you know,” said Tibbs. 

“ So odd altogether ! ” said the superannuated love- 
maker; and then all three laughed. 

“ I say,” said Tibbs, shutting the door which he had 
previously opened, and giving full vent to a hitherto 
corked-up giggle, “ what bothers me is, what will his 
father say ? ” 

Mr. Septimus Hicks looked at Mr. Calton. 

“ Yes ; but the best of it is,” said the latter, giggling 
in his turn, “ I haven’t got a father — he ! he ! he ! ” 

“ You haven’t got a father. No ; but he has,” said 
Tibbs. 

“ Who has ? ” inquired Septimus Hicks. 

“ Why him’^ 

“ Him, who ? Do you know my secret ? Do you 
mean me?” 

“ You ! No ; you know who I mean,” returned Tibbs 
with a knowing wink. 

“ For Heaven’s sake whom do you mean ? ” inquired 
Mr. Calton, who, like Septimus Hicks, was all but out 
of his senses at the strange confusion. 

“ Why Mr. Simpson, of course,” replied Tibbs ; “ who 
else could I mean ? ” 

“ I see it all,” said the Byron-quoter ; “ Simpson mar- 
ries Julia Maplesone to-morrow morning ! ” 

“ Undoubtedly,” replied Tibbs, thoroughly satisfied, 

of course he does.” 

It would require the pencil of Hogarth to illustrate — 
our feeble pen is inadequate to describe — the expression 
which the countenances of Mr. Calton anrl Mr. Septimus 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


58 


Hicks respectively assumed, at this unexpected announce* 
ment. Equally impossible is it to describe, although per- 
haps it is easier for our lady readers to imagine, what 
arts the three ladies could have used, so completely to 
entangle their separate partners. Whatever they were, 
however, they were successful. The mother was per- 
fectly aware of the intended marriage of both daughters ; 
and the young ladies were equally acquainted with the 
intention of their estimable parent. They agreed, how- 
ever, that it would have a much better appearance if 
each feigned ignorance of the other’s engagement ; and 
it was equally desirable that all the marriages should 
take place on the same day, to prevent the discovery of 
one clandestine alliance, operating prejudicially on the 
others. Hence, the mystification of Mr. Calton and Mr. 
Septimus Hicks, and the preengagement of the unwary 
Tibbs. 

On the following morning, Mr. Septimus Hicks was 
united to Miss Matilda Maplesone. Mr. Simpson also 
entered into a “ holy alliance ” with Miss Julia : Tibbs 
acting as father, “ his first appearance in that character.” 
Mr. Calton, not being quite so eager as the two young 
Bien, was rather struck by the double discovery ; and as 
he had found some difiiculty in getting any one to give 
the lady away, it occurred to him that the best mode of 
obviating the inconvenience would be not to take her at 
all. The lady, however, “ appealed,” as her counsel said 
on the trial of the cause, Maplesone v. Gallon, for a 
breach of promise, “ with a broken heart, to the outraged 
laws of her country.” She recovered damages to the 
amount of 1000/. which the unfortunate knocker was 
compelled to pay. Mr. Septimus Hicks having walked 
the hospitals, took it into his head to walk off altogether. 


u 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


His injured wife is at present residing with her mother 
at Boulogne. Mr. Simpson, having the misfortune to 
lose his wife six weeks after marriage (by her eloping 
with an officer during his temporary sojourn in the Fleet 
Prison, in consequence of his inability to discharge her 
little mantua-maker’s bill), and being disinherited by his 
father, who died soon afterwards, was fortunate enough 
to obtain a permanent engagement at a fashionable hair- 
cutter’s ; hairdressing being a science to which he had 
frequently directed his attention. In this situation he 
had necessarily many opportunities of making himself 
acquainted with the habits, and style of thinking, of the 
exclusive portion of the nobility of this kingdom. To 
this fortunate circumstance are we indebted for the pro- 
duction of those brilliant efforts of genius, his fashionable 
novels, which so long as good taste, unsullied by exagger- 
ation, cant, and quackery, continues to exist, cannot fail 
to instruct and amuse the thinking portion of the com- 
munity. 

It only remains to add, that this complication of disor- 
ders completely deprived poor Mrs. Tibbs of all her in- 
mates, except the one whom slie could have best spared 
— her husband. That wretched little man returned 
home, on the day of the wedding, in a state of partial 
intoxication ; and, under the influence of wine, excite- 
ment, and despair, actually dared to brave the anger of 
his wife. Since that ill-fated hour he has constantly 
taken his meals in the kitchen, to which apartment, it is 
<!inderstood, his witticisms will be in future confined : a 
turn-up bedstead having been conveyed there by Mrs. 
Tibbs’s order for his exclusive accommodation. It is 
possible that he will be enabled to finish, in that seclu- 
sion, his story of the volunteers. 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


55 


The advertisement has again appeared in tlie morn- 
ing papers. Eesults must be reserved for another 
chapter. 


CHAPTER THE SECOND. 

“ Well ! ” said little Mrs. Tibbs to herself, as she sat 
in the front parlor of the Coram Street mansion one 
morning, mending a piece of stair-carpet off the first 
landing ; — “ Things have not turned out so badly, 
either, and if I only get a favorable answer to the ad- 
vertisement, we shall be full again.’* 

Mrs. Tibbs resumed her occupation of making worsted 
lattice-work in the carpet, anxiously listening to the two- 
penny postman, who was hammering his way down the 
street, at the rate of a penny a knock. The house was 
as quiet as possible. There was only one low sound to 
be heard — it was the unhappy Tibbs cleaning the gen- 
tlemen’s boots in the back kitchen, and accompanying 
himself with a buzzing noise, in wretched mockery of 
humming a tune. 

The postman drew near the house. He paused — so 
did Mrs. Tibbs. A knock — a bustle — a letter — 
post-paid. 

“ T. I. presents compt. to I. T. and T. I. begs To say 
that i see the advertisement And she will Do Herself 
the pleasure of calling On you at 12 o’clock to-morrow 
morning. 

“T. T. as To apologise to I. T. for the shortness 


56 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


Of the notice But i hope it will not unconvenience 
you. “I remain yours Truly 

“ Wednesday evening.” 

Little Mrs. Tibbs perused the document, over and 
over again ; and the more she read it, the more was she 
confused by the mixture of the first and third person ; 
the substitution of the “ I ” for the “ T. I. ; ” and 
transition of the “I. T.” to the “you.” The writ- 
ing looked like a skein of thread in a tangle, and the 
note was ingeniously folded into a perfect square, with 
the direction squeezed up into the right-hand corner, as 
if it were ashamed of itself. The back of the epistle 
was pleasingly ornamented with a large red wafer, 
which, with the addition of divers ink-stains, bore a 
marvellous resemblance to a black beetle trodden upon. 
One thing, however, was perfectly clear to the perplexed 
Mrs. Tibbs. Somebody was to call at twelve. The 
drawing-room was forthwith dusted for the third time 
that morning ; three or four chairs were pulled out of 
their places, and a corresponding number of books care- 
fully upset, in order that there might be a due absence of 
formality. Down went the piece of stair-carpet before 
noticed, and up ran Mrs. Tibbs “ to make herself tidy.” 

The clock of New Saint Pancras Church struck 
twelve, and the Foundling, with laudable politeness, 
did the same ten minutes afterwards. Saint something 
else struck the quarter, and then there arrived a single 
lady with a double knock, in a pelisse the color of the 
interior of a damson pie ; a bonnet of the same, with a 
"egular conservatory of artificial flowers ; a white veil, 
and a green parasol, with a cobweb border. 

The visitor (who was very fat and red-faced) was 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


57 


shown into the drawing-room; Mrs. Tibbs presented 
herself, and the negotiation commenced. 

“I called in consequence of an advertisement,” said 
the stranger, in a voice as if she had been playing a set 
of Pan's pipes for a fortnight without leaving off. 

“ Yes ! ” said Mrs. Tibbs, rubbing her hands very 
slowly, and looking the applicant full in the face — two 
things she always did on such occasions. 

“ Money isn’t no object w'hatever to me,” said the 
lady, “ so much as living in a state of retirement and 
obtrusion.” 

Mrs. Tibbs, as a matter of course, acquiesced in such 
an exceedingly natural desire. 

“ I am constantly attended by a medical man,” re- 
sumed the pelisse wearer ; “ I have been a shocking 
Unitarian for some time — I, indeed, have had very 
little peace since the death of Mr. Bloss.” 

Mrs. Tibbs looked at the relict of the departed Bloss, 
and thought he must have had very little peace in his 
time. Of course she could not say so; so she looked 
very sympathizing. 

“ I shall be a good deal of trouble to you,” said Mrs. 
Bloss ; “ but, for that trouble I am willing to pay. I 
am going through a course of treatment which renders 
attention necessary. I have one mutton chop in bed at 
half-past eight, and another at ten, every morning.” 

Mrs. Tibbs, as in duty bound, expressed the pity she 
felt for anybody placed in such a distressing situation ; 
and the carnivorous Mrs. Bloss proceeded to arrange the 
various preliminaries with wonderful despatch. “ Now 
mind,” said that lady, after terms were arranged ; “ I am 
to have the second-floor front, for my bedroom ? ” 

“ Yes, ma’am.” 


58 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


“ And you’ll find room for my little servant Agnes ? ** 
Oh ! certainly.” 

“ And I can have one of the cellars in the area for my 
bottled porter.” 

“With the greatest pleasure; — James shall get it 
ready for you by Saturday.” 

“ And I’ll join the company at the breakfast-table on 
Sunday morning,” said Mrs. Bloss. “ I shall get up on 
purpose.” 

“ Very well,” returned Mrs. Tibbs, in her most amiable 
tone ; for satisfactory references had “ been given and re- 
quired,” and it was quite certain that the new comer had 
plenty of money. “ It’s rather singular,” continued Mrs. 
Tibbs, with what was meant for a most bewitching smile, 
“ that we have a gentleman now with us, who is in a 
very delicate state of health — a Mr. Gobler. — His 
apartment is the back drawing-room.” 

“ The next room ? ” inquired Mrs. Bloss. 

“ The next room,” repeated the hostess. 

“ How very promiscuous ! ” ejaculated the widow. 

“ He hardly ever gets up,” said Mrs. Tibbs, in a 
whisper. 

“ Lor ! ” cried Mrs. Bloss, in an equally low tone. 

“ And when he is up,” said Mrs. Tibbs, “ we never can 
persuade him to go to bed again.” 

“ Dear me ! ” said the astonished Mrs. Bloss, drawing 
her chair nearer Mrs. Tibbs. “ What is his complaint ? ” 

“ Why, the fact is,” replied Mrs. Tibbs, wdth a most 
:!ommunicative air, “ he has no stomach whatever.” 

“ No what ? ” inquired Mrs. Bloss, with a look of the 
most indescribable alarm. 

“ No stomach,” repeated Mrs. Tibbs, with a shake of 
the head. 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


6 ^ 


“ Lord bless us ! what an extraordinary case ! ” gasped 
Mrs. Bloss, as if she understood the communication in ite 
literal sense, and was astonished at a gentleman without 
a stomach finding it necessary to board anywhere. 

When I say he has no stomach,” explained the chatty 
little Mrs. Tibbs, “ I mean that his digestion is so much 
impaired, and his interior so deranged, that his stomach 
is not of the least use to him ; — in fact, it’s an incon- 
venience.” 

“ Never heard such a case in my life ! ” exclaimed Mrs. 
Bloss. “ Why, he’s worse than I am.” 

“ Oh, yes ! ” replied Mrs. Tibbs ; — “ certainly.” She 
said this with great confidence, for the damson pelisse 
suggested that Mrs. Bloss, at all events, was not suffer- 
ing under Mr. Gobler’s complaint. 

“ You have quite incited my curiosity,” said Mrs. 
Bloss, as she rose to depart. “ How I long to see 
him ! ” 

“ He generally comes down, once a week,” replied 
Ml'S. Tibbs ; “ I dare say you’ll see him on Sunday.” 
With this consolatory promise Mrs. Bloss was obliged 
to be contented. She accordingly walked slowly down 
the stairs, detailing her complaints all the way ; and 
Mrs. Tibbs followed her, uttering an exclamation of com- 
passion at every step. James (who looked very gritty, 
for he was cleaning the knives) fell up the kitchen-stairs, 
and opened the street-door ; and, after mutual farewells, 
Mrs. Bloss slowly departed, down the shady side of the 
street. 

It is almost superfluous to say, that the lady whom we 
have just shown out at the street-door (and whom the 
two female servants are now inspecting from the second- 
floor windows) was exceedingly vulgar, ignorant, and 


60 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


Belfish. Her deceased better-half had been an eminent 
cork-cutter, in which capacity he had amassed a decent 
fortune. He had no relative but his nephew^, and no 
friend but his cook. The former had the insolence one 
morning to ask for the loan of fifteen pounds ; and, by 
w'ay of retaliation, he married the latter next day ; he 
made a will immediately afterw^^ards, containing a burst 
of honest indignation against his nephew (who supported 
himself and two sisters on 100/. a year), ffnd a bequest 
of his whole property to his wife. He felt ill after 
breakfast, and died after dinner. There is a mantelpiece- 
looking tablet in a civic parish church, setting forth his 
virtues, and deploring his loss. He never dishonored a 
bill, or gave aw'ay a halfpenny. 

The relict and sole executrix of this noble-minded man 
was an odd mixture of shrewdness and simplicity, liber- 
ality and meanness. Bred up as she had been, she knew 
no mode of living so agreeable as a boarding-house ; and 
having nothing to do, and nothing to wish for, she natu- 
rally imagined she must be very ill — an impression 
which was most assiduously promoted by her medical 
attendant. Dr. Wosky, and her handmaid Agnes : both 
of whom, doubtless for good reasons, encouraged all her 
extravagant notions. 

Since the catastrophe recorded in the last chapter, 
Mrs. Tibbs had been very shy of young-lady boarders^ 
Her present inmates were all lords of the creation, and 
ehe availed herself of the opportunity of their assem- 
blage at the dinner-table, to announce the expected arri- 
val of Mrs. Bloss. The gentlemen received the com 
munication with stoical indifference, and Mi*s. Tibbs 
levoted all her energies to prepare for the reception of 
die valetudinarian. The second-fioor front was scrubbed, 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


61 


and washed, and flannelled, till the wet went through to 
the drawing-room ceiling. Clean white counterpanes, 
and curtains, and napkins, water-bottles as clear as crys- 
tal, blue jugs, and mahogany furniture, added to the 
splendor, and increased the comfort, of the apartment. 
The warming-pan was in constant requisition, and a fire 
lighted in the room every day. The chattels of Mrs, 
Bloss were forwarded by instalments. First, there came 
a large hamper of Guinness’s stout, and an umbrella ; 
then, a train of trunks ; then, a pair of clogs and a band- 
box ; then, an easy-chair with an air-cushion ; then, a 
variety of suspicious-looking packages ; and — “ though 
last not least ” — Mrs. Bloss and Agnes : the latter in a 
cherry-colored merino dress, open-work stockings, and 
shoes with sandals : like a disguised Columbine. 

The installation of the Duke of Wellington, as Chan- 
cellor of the University of Oxford, was nothing, in point 
of bustle and turmoil, to the installation of Mrs. Bloss 
in her new quarters. True, there was no bright doctor 
of civil law to deliver a classical address on the occasion ; 
but there w^ere several other old women present, who 
spoke quite as much to the purpose, and understood 
themselves equally well. The chop-eater was so fatigued 
with the process of removal that she declined leaving her 
room until the following morning ; so a mutton-chop, 
pickle, a pill, a pint bottle of stout, and other medicines, 
were carried up-stairs for her consumption. 

“ Why, what do you think, ma’am ? ” inquired the in- 
quisitive Agnes of her mistress, after they had been in 
the house some three hours ; “ what do you think, ma’am ? 
the lady of the house is married.” 

“ Married ! ” said Mrs. Bloss, taking the pill and a 
draught of Guinness — “married! Unpossible!” 


62 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


“ She is indeed, ma’am,” returned the Columbine 
and her husband, ma’am, lives — he — he — he — lives 
in the kitchen, ma’am.” 

“ In the kitchen ! ” 

“ Yes, ma’am ; and he — he — he — the housemaid 
says, he never goes into the parlor except on Sundays ; 
and that Mrs. Tibbs makes him clean the gentlemens 
boots ; and that he cleans the windows, too, sometimes ; 
and that one morning early, when he was in the front 
balcony cleaning the drawing-room windows, he called 
out to a gentleman on the opposite side of the way, who 
used to live here — ‘ Ah ! Mr. Calton, sir, how are 
you?’” Here, the attendant laughed till Mrs, Bloss 
was in serious apprehension of her chuckling herself 
into a ht. 

“ Well, I never ! ” said Mrs. Bloss. 

“Yes. And please, ma’am, the servants gives him 
gin-and-water sometimes; and then he cries, and says 
he hates his wife and the boarders, and wants to tickle 
them.” 

“ Tickle the boarders ! ” exclaimed Mrs. Bloss, seriously 
alarmed. 

“ No, ma’am, not the boarders, the servants.” 

“ Oh, is that all ! ” said Mrs. Bloss, quite satisfied. 

“He wanted to kiss me as I came up the kitchen- 
stairs, just now,” said Agnes, indignantly ; “ but I gave it 
him — a little wretch ! ” 

This intelligence was but too true. A long course of 
inubbing and neglect ; his days spent in the kitchen, and 
nis nights in the turn-up bedstead, had completely broken 
the little spirit that the unfortunate volunteer had ever 
possessed. He had no one to whom he could detail his 
Injuries but the servants, and they were almost of neces- 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


Bity his chosen confidants. It is no less stran/re than 
true, however, that the little weaknesses which he Had 
incurred, most probably during his military career; 
seemed to increase as his comforts diminished. He was 
actually a sort of journeyman Giovanni of the basement 
story. 

The next morning, being Sunday, breakfast was laid 
in the front parlor at ten o’clock. Nine was the usual 
time, but the family always breakfasted an hour later on 
Sabbath. Tibbs enrobed himself in his Sunday costume 
— a black coat, and exceedingly short, thin trousers ; with 
a very large white waistcoat, white stockings and cravat, 
and Blucher boots — and mounted to the parlor afore- 
said. Nobody had come down, and he amused himself 
by drinking the contents of the milkpot with a tea- 
spoon. 

A pair of slippers were heard descending the staire. 
Tibbs flew to a chair ; and a stern-looking man, of about 
fifty, with very little hair on his head, and a Sunday 
paper in his hand, entered the room. 

“ Good morning, Mr. Evenson,” said Tibbs, very hum- 
bly, with something between a nod and bow. 

“ How do you do, Mr. Tibbs ? ” replied he of the slip- 
pers, as he sat himself down, and began to read his paper 
without saying another word. 

“ Is Mr. Wisbottle in town to-day, do you know, sir?’^ 
inquired Tibbs, just for the sake of saying something. 

I should think lie was,” replied the stern gentleman. 
‘ He was whistling ‘ The Light Guitar,’ in the next room 
!:o mine, at five o’clock this morning.” 

“ He’s very fond of whistling,” said Tibbs, with n 
slight smirk. 

“ Yes — I a’u’t,” was the laconic reply. 


64 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


Mr. John Evenson was in the receipt of an indepen- 
dent income, arising chiefly from various houses he owned 
in the different suburbs. He was very morose and dis- 
contented. He was a thorough radical, and used to at- 
tend a great variety of public meetings, for the express 
purpose of finding fault with everything that was pro- 
posed. Mr. Wisbottle, on the other hand, was a high 
'lory. He was a clerk in the Woods and Forests Office, 
which he considered rather an aristocratic employment ; 
he knew the peerage by heart, and could tell you, off- 
hand, where any illustrious personage lived. He had a 
good set of teeth, and a capital tailor. Mr. Evenson looked 
on all these qualifications with profound contempt ; and 
the consequence was that the two were always disputing, 
much to the edification of the rest of the house. It 
should be added, that, in addition to his partiality for 
whistling, Mr. Wisbottle had a great idea of his singing 
powers. There were two other boarders, besides the 
gentleman in the back drawing-room — Mr. Alfred Tom- 
kins and Mr. Frederick O’Bleary. Mr. Tomkins was a 
clerk in a wine-house ; he was a connoisseur in paint- 
ings, and had a wonderful eye for the picturesque. Mr. 
O’Bleary was an Irishman, recently imported ; he was in 
a perfectly wild state ; and had come over to England to 
be an apothecary, a clerk in a government office, an 
actor, a reporter, or anything else that turned up — he 
was not particular. He was on familiar terms with 
two small Irish members, and got franks for everybody 
in the house. He felt convinced that his intrinsic merits 
must procure him a high destiny. He wore shepherd’s- 
plaid inexpressibles, and used to look under all the ladies* 
bonnets as he walked along the streets. His manners 
»nd appearance reminded one of Orson. 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


65 


“ Here comes Mr. Wisbottle,” said Tibbs ; and Mr. 
Wisbottle forthwith appeared in blue slippers, and a 
shawl dressing-gown, whistling piacer'’ 

“ Good morning, sir,” said Tibbs again. It was almost 
the only thing he ever said to anybody. 

“ How are you, Tibbs ? ” condescendingly replied the 
amateur ; and he walked to the window, and whistled 
louder than ever. 

“ Pretty air, that ! ” said Evenson, with a snarl, and 
without taking his eyes off the paper. 

“ Glad you like it,” replied Wisbottle, highly gratified. 

Don’t you think it would sound better, if you whis- 
tled it a little louder ? ” inquired the mastiff. 

“ No ; I don’t think it would,” rejoined the unconscious 
Wisbottle. 

“ I’ll tell you what, Wisbottle,” said Evenson,- who had 
been bottling up his anger for some hours — “ the next 
time you feel disposed to whistle ‘ The Light Guitar ’ at 
five o’clock in the morning. I’ll trouble you to whistle it 
with your head out o’ window. If you don’t. I’ll learn 
the triangle — I will by — ” 

The entrance of Mrs. Tibbs (with the keys in a little 
basket) interrupted the threat, and prevented its conclu- 
sion. 

Mrs. Tibbs apologized for being down rather late ; the 
bell was rung ; James brought up the urn, and received 
an unlimited order for dry toast and bacon. Tibbs sat 
down at the bottom of the table, and began eating 
water-cresses like a Nebuchadnezzar. Mr. O’Bleary 
appeared, and Mr. Alfred Tomkins. The compliments 
Df the morning were exchanged, and the tea was 
made. 

“ God bless me ! ” exclaimed Tomkins, who had been 
5 


VOL. II 


66 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


looking out at the window. “ Here — Wisbottle — - pray 
come here — make haste.” 

Mr. Wisbottle started from the table, and every one 
looked up. 

Do you see,” said the connoisseur, placing Wisbottle 
in the right position — ‘‘a little more this way : there — 
do you see how splendidly the light falls upon the left 
side of that broken chimney-pot at No. 48 ? ” 

“ Dear me ! I see,” replied Wisbottle, in a tone of ad- 
miration. 

I never saw an object stand out so beautifully against 
the clear sky in my life,” ejaculated Alfred. Everybody 
(except John Evenson) echoed the sentiment ; for Mr. 
Tomkins had a great character for finding out beauties 
which no one else could discover — he certainly de- 
served it. 

“ I have frequently observed a chimney-pot in College 
Green, Dublin, which has a much better effect,” said the 
patriotic O’Bleary, who never allowed Ireland to be out- 
done on any point. 

The assertion was received with obvious incredulity, 
for Mr. Tomkins declared that no other chimney-pot in 
the United Kingdom, broken or unbroken, could be so 
beautiful as the one at No. 48. 

The room-door was suddenly thrown open, and Agnes 
appeared leading in Mrs. Bloss, who was dressed in a 
geranium-colored muslin gown, and displayed a gold 
watch of huge dimensions ; a chain to match ; and a 
splendid assortment of rings, with enormous stones. A 
general rush was made for a chair, and a regular intro- 
duction took place. Mr. John Evenson made a slight 
inclination of the head ; Mr. Frederick O’Bleary, Mr. 
Alfred Tomkins, and Mr. Wisbottle, bowed like the man- 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


67 


darins in a grocer’s shop ; Tibbs rubbed hands, and went 
round in circles. He was observed to close one eye, and to 
assume a clock-work sort of expression with the other ; 
this has been considered as a wink, and it has been 
reported that Agnes was its object. We repel the 
cidumny, and challenge contradiction. 

Mrs. Tibbs inquired after Mrs. Bloss’s health in a low 
tone. Mrs. Bloss, with a supreme contempt for the 
memory of Bindley Murray, answered the various ques- 
tions in a most satisfactory manner ; and a pause ensued, 
during which the eatables disappeared with awful ra- 
pidity. 

“You must have been very much pleased with the 
appearance of the ladies going to the drawing-room the 
other day, Mr. O’Bleary ? ” said Mrs. Tibbs, hoping to 
start a topic. 

“ Yes,” replied Orson, with a mouthful of toast. 

“ Never saw anything like it before, I suppose ? ” sug- 
gested Wisbottle. 

“ No — except the Lord Lieutenant’s levees,” replied 
O’Bleary. 

“Are they at all equal to our drawing-rooms ? ” 

“ Oh, infinitely superior ! ” 

“ Gad ! I don’t know,” said the aristocratic Wisbottle, 
“the Dowager Marchioness of Publiccash was most 
magnificently dressed, and so was the Baron Slappen- 
fcachenhausen.” 

“ What was he presented on ? ” inquired Everson. 

“ On his arrival in England.” 

“ I thought so,” growled the radical ; “ you never hear 
jf these fellows being presented on their going away 
again. They know better than that.” 

“ Unless somebody pervades them with an apint- 


68 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


merit, ” said Mrs. Bloss, joining in the conversation in a 
faint voice. 

“ Well,” said Wisbottle, evading the point, it’s a 
splendid sight.” 

“And did it never occur to you,” inquired the rad- 
ical, who never would be quiet ; “ did it never occur to 
you, that you pay for these precious ornaments of so- 
ciety ? ” 

“ It certainly has occurred to me,” said Wisbottle, who 
thought this answer was a poser ; “ it has occurred to me, 
and I am willing to pay for them.” 

“ Well, and it has occurred to me too,” replied John 
Evenson, “ and I a’n’t willing to pay for ’em. Then why 
should I ? — I say, why should I ? ” continued the poli- 
tician, laying down the paper, and knocking his knuckles 
on the table. “ There are two great principles — de- 
mand — ” 

“ A cup of tea if you please, dear,” interrupted Tibbs. 

“ And supply — ” 

“ May I trouble you to hand this tea to Mr. Tibbs ? ” 
said Mrs. Tibbs, interrupting the argument, and uncon- 
sciously illustrating it. 

The thread of the orator’s discourse was broken. He 
drank his tea and resumed the paper. 

“ If it’s very fine,” said Mr. Alfred Tomkins, address- 
ing the company in general, “ I shall ride down to Rich- 
mond to-day, and come back by the steamer. There ai-e 
some splendid effects of light and shade on the Thames ; 
the contrast between the blueness of the sky and the 
yellow water is frequently exceedingly beautiful.” Mr. 
Wisbottle hummed, “ Flow on, thou shining river.” 

“ We have some splendid steam-vessels in Ireland,** 
said O’ Bleary. 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


69 


“ Certainly,” said Mrs. Bloss, delighted to find a sub- 
ject broached in which she could take part. 

“The accommodations are extraordinary,” said O’- 
Bleary. 

“ Extraordinary indeed,” returned Mrs. Bloss. “ When 
Mr, Bloss was alive, he was promiscuously obligated to 
go to Ireland on business. I went with him, and raly 
the manner in which the ladies and gentlemen were 
accommodated with berths, is not creditable.” 

Tibbs, who had been listening to the dialogue, looked 
aghast, and evinced a strong inclination to ask a question, 
but was checked by a look from his wife. Mr. Wisbottle 
laughed, and said Tomkins had made a pun ; and Tom- 
kins laughed too, and said he had not. ' 

The remainder of the meal passed oflP as breakfasts 
usually do. Conversation flagged, and people played 
with their tea-spoons. The gentlemen looked out at the 
window ; walked about the room ; and, when they got 
near the door, dropped off one by one. Tibbs retired to 
the back parlor by his wife’s orders, to check the green- 
grocer’s weekly account ; and ultimately Mrs. Tibbs and 
Mrs. Bloss were left alone together. 

“ Oh dear ! ” said the latter, “ I feel alarmingly faint ; 
it’s very singular.” (It certainly was, for she had eaten 
four pounds of solids that morning.) “ By the by,” said 
Mrs. Bloss, “ I have not seen Mr. What’s his name yet.” 

“ Mr. Gobler ? ” suggested Mrs. Tibbs. 

“ Yes.” 

“ Oh I ” said Mrs. Tibbs, “ he is a most mysterious 
person. He has his meals regularly sent up-stairs, and 
sometimes don’t leave his room for weeks together.” 

“ I haven’t seen or heard nothing of him,” repeated 
Mrs. Bloss. 


ro 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


‘‘I dare say you’ll hear him to-night,” replied Mrs. 
Tibbs ; “ he generally groans a good deal on Sunday 
' evenings.” 

“ I never felt such an interest in any one in my life,” 
ejaculated Mrs. Bloss. A little double-knock interrupted 
the conversation ; Doctor Wosky was announced, and 
duly shown in. He was a little man with a red face, — 
dressed of course in black, 'with a stiff white neckerchief. 
He had a very good practice, and plenty of money, which 
he had amassed by invariably humoring the worst fancies 
of all the females of all the families he had ever been 
introduced into. ISIrs. Tibbs offered to retire, but was 
entreated to stay. 

“ Well, my dear ma’am, and how are we ? ” inquired 
Wosky, in a soothing tone. 

“ Very ill, doctor — very ill,” said Mrs. Bloss, in a 
whisper. 

“ Ah ! we must take care of ourselves ; — we must, 
indeed,” said the obsequious Wosky, as he felt the pulse 
of his interesting patient. 

“ How is our appetite ? ” 

Mrs. Bloss shook her head. 

Our friend requires great care,” said Wosky, appeal- 
ing to Mrs. Tibbs, who of course assented. “ I hope, 
however, with the blessing of Providence, that we shall 
'be enabled to make her quite stout again.” Mrs. Tibbs 
wondered in her own mind what the patient would be 
U'hen she was made quite stout. 

“ We must take stimulants,” said the cunning Wosky 
— “ plenty of nourishment, and, above all, we must keep 
our nerves quiet ; we positively must not give way to 
Dur sensibilities. We must take all we can get,” con- 
duded the doctor, as he pocketed liis fee, “ and we must 
keep quiet.” 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


71 


“ Dear man ! ” exclaimed ISIrs. Bloss, as the doctor 
stepped into his carriage. 

“ Charming creature indeed — quite a lady’s man ! ” 
said Mrs. Tibbs, and Doctor Wosky rattled away to 
make fresh gulls of delicate females, and pocket fresh 
fees. 

As we had occasion, in a former paper, to describe a 
dinner at Mrs. Tibbs’s ; and as one meal went off very 
like another on all ordinary occasions ; we will not 
fatigue our readers by entering into any other detailed 
account of the domestic economy of the establishment. 
We will therefore proceed to events, merely premising 
that the mysterious tenant of the back drawing-room 
was a lazy, selfish hypochondriac ; always complaining 
and never ill. As his character in many respects closely 
assimilated to that of Mrs. Bloss, a very warm friendship 
soon sprang up between them. He was tall, thin, and 
pale ; he always fancied he had a severe pain somewhere 
or other, and his face invariably wore a pinched, screwed- 
up expression ; he looked, indeed, like a man who had 
got his feet in a tub of exceedingly hot water, against 
his will. 

For two or three months after Mrs. Blc s’s first ap- 
pearance in Coram Street, John Evenson was observed 
to become, every day, more sarcastic, and more ill- 
natured ; and there was a degree of additional impor- 
tance in his manner, which clearly showed that he fan- 
cied he had discovered something, which he only wanted 
a proper opportunity of divulging. He found it at 
last. 

One evening, the different inmates of the house were 
assembled in the drawing-room engaged in their ordinary 
occupations. Mr. Gobler and Mrs. Bloss were sitting at 


72 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


a small card-table near the centre window, playing crib- 
bage ; Mr. Wisbottle was describing semicircles on the 
music-stool, turning over the leaves of a book on the 
piano, and humming most melodiously ; Alfred Tomkins 
was sitting at the round table, with his elbows duly 
squared, making a pencil sketch of a head considerably 
larger than his own ; O’Bleary was reading Horace, and 
trying to look as if he understood it ; and John Evenson 
had drawn his chair close to Mrs. Tibbs’s work-table, and 
was talking to her very earnestly in a low tone. 

“ I can assure you, Mrs. Tibbs,” said the radical, lay- 
ing his forefinger on the muslin she was at work on ; “I 
can assure you, Mrs. Tibbs, that nothing but the interest 
I take in your welfare would induce me to make this 
communication. I repeat, I fear Wisbottle is endeavor- 
ing to gain the affections of that young woman, Agnes, 
and that he is in the habit of meeting her in the store- 
room on the first floor, over the leads. From my bed- 
room I distinctly heard voices there, last night. I opened 
my door immediately, and crept very softly on to the 
landing : there I saw Mr. Tibbs, who, it seems, had 
been disturbed also. — Bless me, Mrs. Tibbs, you change 
color ! ” 

“ No, no — it’s nothing,” returned Mrs. T. in a hurried 
manner ; “ it’s only the heat of the room.” 

“ A flush ! ” ejaculated Mrs. Bloss from the card-table ; 
“ that’s good for four.” 

“ If 1 thought it was Mr. Wisbottle,” said Mrs. Tibbs, 
after a pause, “ he should leave this house instantly.” 

“ Go ! ” said Mrs. Bloss again. 

“ And if I thought,” continued the hostess with a most 
i-hreatening air, “ if I thought he was assisted by Mr. 
Tibbs — ” 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


73 


“ One for his nob ! ” said Gobler. 

“ Oh,” said Evenson, in a most soothing tone — he 
liked to make mischief — “I should hope Mr. Tibbs was 
not in any way implicated. He always appeared to me 
very harmless.” 

“I have generally found him so,” sobbed poor little 
Mj-s. Tibbs; crying like a watering-pot. 

“ Hush ! hush ! pray — Mrs. Tibbs — consider — we 
shall be observed — pray, don’t ! ” said John Evenson, 
fearing his whole plan would be interrupted. “ We will 
set the matter at rest with the utmost care, and I shall 
be most happy to assist you in doing so.” 

Mrs. Tibbs murmured her thanks. 

“When you think every one has retired to rest to- 
night,” said Evenson very pompously, “ if you’ll meet 
me without a light, just outside my bedroom-door, by the 
staircase-window, I think we can. ascertain who the par- 
ties really are, and you will afterwards be enabled to 
proceed as you think proper.” 

Mrs. Tibbs was easily persuaded ; her curiosity was 
excited, her jealousy was roused, and the arrangement 
was forthwith made. She resumed her w'ork, and John 
Evenson walked up and down the room mth his hands 
in his pockets, looking as if nothing had happened. The 
game of cribbage w^as over, and conversation began 
again. 

“ Well, Mr. O’Bleary,” said the humming-top, turning 
round on his pivot, and facing the company, “ what did 
you think of Vauxhall the other night ? ” 

“ Oh, it’s very fair,” replied Orson, who had been en- 
thusiastically delighted with the whole exhibition. 

“ Never saw anything like that Captain Ross’s set-out 
-eh?” 


74 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


“ No,” returned the patriot, with his usual reservation 
■— “ except in Dublin.” 

“ I saw the Count de Canky and Captain Fitzthomp- 
Bon in the Gardens,” said Wisbottle ; “ they appeared 
much delighted.” 

“ Then it must be beautiful,” snarled Evenson. 

“ I think the white bears is partickerlerly well dona,” 
suggested Mrs. Bloss. “ In their shaggy white coats they 
look just like Polar bears — don’t you think they do, 
Mr. Evenson ? ” 

“ I think they look a great deal more like omnibus cads 
on all fours,” replied the discontented one. 

“ Upon the whole, I should have liked our evening 
very well,” gasped Gobler ; “ only I caught a desperate 
cold which increased my pain dreadfully ! I was obliged 
to have several shower-baths, before I could leave my* 
room.” 

“ Capital things those shower-baths ! ” ejaculated Wis- 
bottle. 

“ Excellent ! ” said Tomkins. 

“ Delightful ! ” chimed in O’ Bleary. (He had once 
seen one outside a tinman’s.) 

“ Disgusting machines ! ” rejoined Evenson, who ex- 
tended his dislike to almost every created object, mascu- 
line, feminine, or neuter. 

“ Disgusting, Mr. Evenson ! ” said Gobler, in a tone 
of strong indignation. — “ Disgusting ! Look at their 
utility — consider how many lives they have saved by 
promoting perspiration.” 

“ Promoting perspiration, indeed,” growled John Even- 
eon, stopping short m his walk across the large squares 
m the pattern of the carpet — “I was ass enough to be 
oersuaded some time ago to have one in my bedroom. 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


76 


Gad, I was in it once, and it effectually cured me, for 
whe mere sight of it threw me into a profuse perspiration 
for six months afterwards.” 

A titter follow^ed this announcement, and before it had 
subsided James brought up “the tray,” containing the' 
remains of a leg of lamb which had made its dehut at 
dinner ; bread ; cheese ; an atom of butter in a forest 
of parsley ; one pickled walnut and the third of another, 
and so forth. The boy disappeared, and returned again 
with another tray, containing glasses and jugs of hot and 
cold water. The gentlemen brought in their spirit bob 
ties ; the housemaid placed divers plated bedroom can- 
dlesticks under the card-table ; and the servants retired 
for the night. 

Chairs were drawn round the table, and the convei*sa 
tion proceeded in the customary manner. John Evenson, 
who never ate supper, lolled on the sofa, and amused 
himself by contradicting everybody. O’Bleary ate as 
much as he could conveniently carry, and Mrs. Tibbs 
felt a due degree of indignation thereat ; Mr. Gobler 
and Mrs. Bloss conversed most affectionately on the 
subject of pill-taking and other innocent amusements : 
and Tomkins and Wisbottle “ got into an argument ; ” 
•that is to say, they both talked very loudly and vehe- 
mently, each flattering himself that he had got some 
advantage about something, and neither of them having 
more than a very indistinct idea of what they were talk- 
ing about. An hour or two passed away ; and the 
boarders and the brass candlesticks retired in pairs to 
their respective bedrooms. John Evenson pulled off his 
boots, locked his door, and determined to sit up until Mr. 
Gobler had retired. He always sat in the drawing-room 
an hour after everybody else had left it, taking medicine, 
and groaning. 


76 


SKETCHES BY BOZ 


Great Coram Street was hushed into a state of pro- 
found repose : it was nearly two o’clock. A hackney 
coach now and then rumbled slowly by ; and occasionally 
some stray lawyer’s clerk, on his way home to Somers’ 
Town, struck his iron heel on the top of the coal-cellar 
with a noise resembling the click of a smoke-jack. A 
low, monotonous, gushing sound was heard, which added 
considerably to the romantic dreariness of the scene. 
It was the water “ coming in ” at number eleven. 

“ He must be asleep by this time,” said John Evenson 
to himself after waiting with exemplary patience for 
nearly an hour after Mr. Gobler had left the drawing- 
room. He listened for a few moments ; the house was 
perfectly quiet ; he extinguished his rushlight, and 
opened his bedroom-door. The staircase was so dark 
that it was impossible to see anything. 

“ S — s — s ! ” whispered the mischief-maker, making a 
noise like the first indication a Catherine-wheel gives of 
the probability of its going ofif. 

“ Hush ; ” whispered somebody else. 

“ Is that you, Mrs. Tibbs ? ” 

“ Yes, sir.” 

“ Where ? ” 

“ Here ; ” and the misty outline of Mrs. Tibbs ap- 
peared at the staircase window like the ghost of Queen 
Anne in the tent scene in Richard. 

“This way, Mrs. Tibbs,” whispered the delighted 
busybody : “ give me your hand — there ! Whoever 
these people are, they are in the store-room now, for I 
have been looking down from my window, and I could 
see that they accidentally upset their candlestick, and 
are now in darkness. You have no shoes on, have 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


77 


“ No,” said little Mrs. Tibbs, who could hardly speak 
for trembling. 

“Well; I have taken my boots off, so we can go 
down, close to the storeroom-door, and listen over the 
banisters and down-stairs they both crept accord- 
ingly, every board creaking like a patent mangle on a 
Saturday afternoon.- 

“ It’s Wisbottle and somebody. I’ll swear,” exclaimed 
the radical, in an energetic whisper, when they had 
listened for a few moments. 

“ Hush — pray let’s hear what they say ! ” exclaimed 
Mrs. Tibbs, the gratification of whose curiosity was now 
paramount to every other consideration. 

“ Ah ! if I could but believe you,” said a female voice 
coquettishly, “ I’d be bound to settle my missis for life.” 

“ What does she say ? ” inquired Mr. Evenson, who 
was not quite so well situated as his companion. 

“ She says .she’ll settle her missis’s life,” replied Mrs. 
Tibbs. “ The wretch ! they’re plotting murder.” 

“ I know you want money,” continued the voice, which 
belonged to Agnes ; “ and if you’d secure me the five 
hundred pound, I warrant she should take fire soon 
enough.” 

“ What’s that ? ” inquired Evenson again. He could 
just hear enough to want to hear more. 

“ I think she says she’ll set the house on fire,” replied 
the affrighted Mrs. Tibbs. “ But thank God I’m insured 
in the Phoenix ! ” 

“ The moment I have secured your mistress, my dear,” 
said a man’s voice, in a strong Irish brogue, “ you may 
depend on having the money.” 

“ Bless my soul, it’s Mr. O’Bleary ! ” exclaimed Mrs 
Tibbs, in a parenthesis. 


78 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


“ The villain ! ” said the indignant Mr. Evenson. 

“ The first thing to be done,” continued the Hibernian, 
'‘is to poison Mr. Gobler’s mind.” 

“ Oh, certainly ; ” returned Agnes. 

“ What’s that ? ” inquired Evenson again, in an agony 
of curiosity and a whisper. 

“ He says she’s to mind and poison Mr. Gobler,” re- 
plied Mrs. Tibbs, aghast at this sacrifice of human life. 

“ And in regard of Mrs. Tibbs,” continued O’Bleary. 
— Mrs. Tibbs shuddered. 

“ Hush ! ” exclaimed Agnes, in a tone of the greatest 
alarm, just as Mrs. Tibbs was on the extreme verge of a 
fainting-fit. “ Hush ! ” 

' “ Hush ! ” exclaimed Evenson, at the same moment to 
Mrs. Tibbs. 

“ There’s somebody coming up stairs,” said Agnes to 
O’Bleary. 

“There’s somebody coming down stairs,” whispered 
Evenson to Mrs. Tibbs. 

Go into the parlor, sir,” said Agnes to her compan- 
ion. “ You will get there, before whoever it is, gets to 
the-top of the kitchen-stairs.” 

“ The drawing-room, Mrs. Tibbs ! ” whispered the 
astonished Evenson to his equally astonished compan- 
ion ; and for the drawing-room they both made, plainly 
hearing the rustling of two persons, one coming down 
stairs, and one coming up. 

“ What can it be ? ” exclaimed Mrs. Tibbs. “ It’s 
like a dream. I wouldn’t be found in this situation for 
.he world ! ” 

“ Nor I,” returned Evenson, who could never bear a 
joke at his own expense. “ Hush ! here they are at the 
ioor.” 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


79 


“ What fun ? ” whispered one of the new-comers. — It 
was Wisbottle. 

“ Glorious ! ” replied his companion, in an equally low 
tone. — This was Alfred Tomkins. “ Who would have 
thought it ? ” 

“ I told you so,” said Wisbottle, in a most knowing 
whisper. “ Lord bless you, he has paid her most ex- 
traordinary attention for the last two months. I saw 
’em when I was sitting at the piano to-night.” 

“Well, do you know I didn’t notice it.^” interrupted 
Tomkins. 

“ Not notice it I ” continued Wisbottle. “ Bless you ; 
I saw him whispering to her, and she crying ; and then 
I’ll, swear I heard him say something about to-night 
when we were all in bed.” 

“ They’re talking of us ! ” exclaimed the agonized 
Mrs. Tibbs, as the painful suspicion, and a sense of 
their situation, flashed upon her mind. 

“ I know it — I know it,” replied Evenson, with a 
melancholy consciousness that there was no mode of 
escape. 

“ What’s to be done ? we cannot both stop here ! ” ejac- 
ulated Mrs. Tibbs, in a state of partial derangement. 

“ I’ll get up the chimney,” replied Evenson, who really 
meant what he said. 

“ You can’t,” said Mrs. Tibbs, in despair. “ You can’t 
— it’s a register stove.” 

“ Hush ! ” repeated John Evenson. 

“ Hush — hush ! ” cried somebody down-stairs. 

“ What a d — d hushing ! ” said Alfred Tomkins, who 
began to get rather bewildered. 

“ There they are ! ” exclaimed the sapient Wisbottle. 
as a rustling noise was heard in the storeroom. 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


RO 


“ Hark ! ” whispered both the young men. 

“ Hark ! ” repeated Mrs. Tibbs and Evenson. 

“ Let me alone, sir,” said a female voice in the store- 
room. 

“ Oh, Hagnes ! ” cried another voice, which clearly be- 
onged to Tibbs, for nobody else ever owned one like it. 

‘ Oh, Hagnes — lovely creature ! ” 

“ Be quiet, sir ! ” (A bounce.) 

“ Hag — ” 

“ Be quiet, sir — I am ashamed of you. Think of 
your wife, Mr. Tibbs. Be quiet, sir ? ” 

“ My wife ! ” exclaimed the valorous Tibbs, who was 
clearly under the influence of gin-and-water, and a mis- 
placed attachment ; “ I ate her ! Oh, Hagnes ! when 
I was in the volunteer corps, in eighteen hundred 
and — ” ^ 

“I declare I’ll scream. Be quiet, sir, will you? 
(Another bounce and a scuffle.) 

“ What’s that ? ” exclaimed Tibbs, with a start. 

“ What’s what ? ” said Agnes, stopping short. 

« Why, that!” 

“ Ah ! you have done it nicely now, sir,” sobbed the 
frightened Agnes, as a tapping was heard at Mrs. Tibbs’ 
bedroom-door, which would have beaten any dozen wood- 
peckers hollow. 

“ Mrs. Tibbs 1 Mrs. Tibbs ! ” called out Mrs. Bloss. 
“ Mrs. Tibbs, pray get up.” (Here the imitation of a 
woodpecker was resumed with tenfold violence.) 

“ Oh, dear — dear I ” exclaimed the wretched partner 
of the depraved Tibbs. “ She’s knocking at my door 
We must be discovered 1 What will they think ? ” 

“ Mrs. Tibbs ! Mrs. Tibbs I ” screamed the wood- 
oecker again. 


THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 


81 


“ What’s the matter ! ” shouted Gobler, bursting out 
of the back drawing-room, like the dragon at Astley’s. 

“ Oh, Mr. Gobler ! ” cried Mrs. Bloss, with a proper ' 
approximation to hysterics ; “ I think the house is on 
fire, or else there’s thieves in it. I have heard the most 
dreadful noises ! ” 

“ The devil you have ! ” shouted Gobler again, bounc- 
ing back into his den, in happy imitation of the aforesaid 
dragon, and returning immediately with a lighted candle. 

Why, what’s this ? Wisbottle ! Tomkins ! O’Bleary ! 
Agnes ! What the deuce ! all up and dressed ? ” 

“ Astonishing ! ” said Mrs. Bloss, who had run down- 
stairs, and taken Mr. Gobler’s arm. 

“ Call Mrs. Tibbs directly, somebody,” said Gobler, 
turning into the front drawing-room. “ What! Mrs. 
Tibbs and Mr. Evenson ! ! ” 

“ Mrs. Tibbs and Mr. Evenson I ” repeated everybody, 
as that unhappy pair were discovered : Mrs. Tibbs seated 
in an arm-chair by the fireplace, and Mr. Evenson stand- 
ing by her side. 

We must leave the scene that ensued to the reader’s 
imagination. We could tell, how Mrs. Tibbs forthwith 
fainted away, and how it required the united strength of 
INIr. Wisbottle and Mr. Alfred Tomkins to hold her in 
her chair ; how Mr. Evenson explained, and how his ex- 
planation was evidently disbelieved ; how Agnes repelled 
the accusations of Mrs. Tibbs, by proving that she was 
negotiating with Mr. O’Bleary to influence her mistress’s 
affections in his behalf ; and how Mr. Gobler threw a 
damp counterpane on the hopes of Mr. O’Bleary by 
avowing that he (Gobler) had already proposed to, and 
been accepted by, Mrs. Bloss ; how Agnes was discharged 
from that lady’s service ; how Mr. O’Bleary discharged 
6 


VOL. II. 


S2 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


himself from Mrs. Tibbs’s house, without going through 
the form of previously discharging his bill ; and how that 
disappointed young gentleman rails against England and 
the English, and vows there is no virtue or fine feeling 
extant, “ except in Ireland.” We repeat that we could 
tell all this, but we love to exercise our self-denial, and 
we therefore prefer leaving it to be imagined. 

The lady whom we have hitherto described as Mrs. 
Bloss, is no more. Mrs. Gobler exists ; Mrs. Bloss has 
left us forever. In a secluded retreat in Newington 
Butts, far, far, i:emoved from the noisy strife of that 
great boarding-house, the world, the enviable Gobler and 
his pleasing wife revel in retirement ; happy in their com- 
plaints, their table, and their medicine ; wafted through 
life by the grateful prayers of all the purveyors of animal 
food within three miles round. 

We would willingly stop here, but we have a painful 
duty imposed upon us which we must discharge. Mr. 
and Mrs. Tibbs have separated by mutual consent, Mrs. 
Tibbs receiving one moiety of 43/. 155. 10c/., Avhich we 
before stated to be the amount of her husband’s annual 
income, and Mr Tibbs the other. He is spending the 
evening of his days in retirement ; and he is spending 
also, annually, that small but honorable independence. 
He resides among the original settlei’s at AVal worth ; and 
it has been stated, on unquestionable authority, that the 
( onclusion of the volunteeer story has been heard in a 
small tavern in that respectable neighborhood. 

Tlie unfortunate Mrs. Tibbs has determined to dispose 
of the whole of her furniture by public auction, and to 
i-etire from a residence in which she has suffered so 
much. Mr. Robins has been applied to, to conduct the 
sale, and the transcendent abilities of the literary gentle* 


MR. MINNS AND HIS COUSIN. 


83 ^ 


men connected with his establishment are now devoted 
to the task of drawing up the preliminary advertisement. . 
It is to contain, among a variety of brilliant matter, sev- 
enty-eight words in large capitals, and six original quota 
tions in inverted commas. 


CHAPTER II. 

MR. MINNS AND HIS COUSIN. 

Mr. Augustus Minns was a bachelor, of about forty 
as he said — of about eight-and-forty as his friends said. 
He was always exceedingly clean, precise, and tidy ; per- 
haps somewhat priggish, and the most retiring man in the 
world. He usually wore a brown frock-coat without a 
wrinkle, light inexplicables without a spot, a neat neck- 
erchief with a remarkably neat tie, and boots without a 
fault ; moreover, he always carried a brown silk umbrella 
with an ivory handle. He was a clerk in Somerset 
House, or, as he said himself, he held “ a responsible 
situation under Government.” He had a good and in- 
creasing salary, in addition to some 10,000/. of his own 
(invested in the funds), and he occupied a first floor in 
Tavistock Street, Covent Garden, where he had resided 
for twenty years, having been in the habit of quarrelling 
with his landlord the whole time : regularly giving notice 
of his intention to quit on the first day of every quarter, 
and as regularly countermanding it on the second. There 
wei’e two classes of created objects which he held in the 
deepest and most unmingled horror ; these were dogs 


84 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


apd children. He was not unamiable, but he could, at 
any time, have viewed the execution of a dog, or the 
assassination of an infant, with the liveliest satisfaction. 
Their habits were at variance with his love of order ; 
and his love of order was as powerful as his love of life. 
Mr. Augustus Minns had no relations, in or near Lon- 
don, with the exception of his cousin, Mr. Octavius 
Budden, to whose son, whom be had never seen (for he 
disliked the fatlier) he had consented to become godfather 
by proxy. Mr. Budden having realized a moderate for- 
tune by exercising the trade or calling of a com-chandler, 
and having a great predilection for the country, had pur- 
chased a cottage in the vicinity of Stamford Hill, whither 
he retired with the wife of his bosom, and his only son, 
Master Alexander Augustus Budden. One evening, as 
Mr. and Mrs. B. were admiring their son, discussing his 
various merits, talking over his education, and disputing 
whether the classics should be made an essential part 
thereof, the lady pressed so strongly upon her husband 
the propriety of cultivating the friendship of Mr. Minns 
in behalf of their son, that Mr. Budden at last made up 
his mind, that it should not be his fault if he and his 
cousin were not in future more intimate. 

“ I’ll break the ice, my love,” said Mr. Budden, stir- 
ring up the sugar at the bottom of his glass of brandy- 
and-water, and casting a sidelong look at his spouse to 
see the elFect of the announcement of his determina- 
tion, “ by asking Minns down to dine with us, on Sun- 
day.” 

“ Then, pray Budden write to your cousin at once,*' 
replied Mrs. Budden. “ Who knows, if we could only 
get him down here, but he might take a fancy to our 


MR. MINNS AND HIS COUSIN. 


85 


Alexander, and leave him his property ? — Alick, my 
ilear, take your legs off the rail of the chair ! ” 

“Very true,” said Mr. Budden, musing, “ very true, 
iiidefcd, ray love ! ” 

On the following morning, as Mr. Minns was sitting 
a- his breakfast-table, alternately biting his dry toast, and 
casting a look upon the columns of his morning paper, 
which he always read from the title to the printer’s 
name, he heard a loud knock at the street-door ; which 
was shortly afterwards followed by the entrance of his 
servant, who put into his hand a particularly small card, 
on which was engraven in immense letters “ Mr. Octavius 
Budden, Amelia Cottage, (Mrs. B.’s name was Amelia,) 
Poplar Walk, Stamford Hill.” 

“ Budden ! ” ejaculated Minns, “ what can bring that 
vulgar man here ! — say I’m asleep — say I’m out, and 
shall never be home again — anything to keep him down- 
stairs.” 

“ But please, sir, the gentleman’s coming up,” replied 
the servant : and the fact was made evident by an appall- 
ing creaking of boots on the staircase accompanied by a 
pattering noise ; the cause of which, Minns could not, for 
the life of him, divine. 

“ Hem ! — show the gentleman in,” said the unfortu- 
nate bachelor. Exit servant, and enter Octavius pre- 
ceded by a large wliite dog, dressed in a suit of fleecy 
hosiery, with pink eyes, large ears, and no perceptible 
tail. 

The cause of the pattering on the stairs was but too 
plain. Mr. Augustus Minns stag^red beneath the shock 
)f the dog’s appearance. 

“ My dear fellow, how are you ^ ” said Budden, as he 
mtered. 


B6 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


He always spoke at the top of his voice, and always 
«aid the same thing half a dozen times. 

“ How are you, my hearty ? ” 

“ How do you do, Mr. Budden? — pray take a chair ! ** 
politely stammered the discomfited Minns. 

“ Thank you — thank you — well — how are you, eh ? ” 

“ Uncommonly well, thank you,” said Minns, casting a 
diabolical look at the dog, who, with his hind legs on the 
floor, and his fore paws resting on the table, was drag- 
ging a bit of bread and butter out of a plate preparatory 
to devouring it, with the buttered side next the carpet. 

“ Ah, you rogue I ” said Budden to his dog ; you see, 
Minns, he’s like me, always at home, eh, my boy? — 
Egad, I’m precious hot and hungry ! I’ve walked all the 
way from Stamford Hill this morning.” 

“ Have you breakfasted ? ” inquired Minns. 

“ Oh, no ! — came to breakfast with you ; so ring the 
bell, my dear fellow, will you? and let’s have another 
cup and saucer, and the cold ham. — Make myself at 
home you see ! ” continued Budden, dusting his boots 
with a table napkin. “ Ha ! — ha ! — ha ! — ’pon my 
life, I’m hungry.” 

Minns rang the bell and tried to smile. 

“ I decidedly never was so hot in my life,” continued 
Octavius, wiping his forehead : “ well, but how are you, 
Minns ? ’Pon my soul, you wear capitally ! ” 

“ D’ye think so ? ” said Minns ; and he tried another 
smile. 

“ ’Pon my life, I do ! ” 

“ Mrs. B. and — whatfe his name — quite well ? ” 

“ Alick — my son, you mean, never better — never 
better. But at such a place as we’ve got at Poplar 
Walk, you know, he couldn’t be ill if he tried. When 


MR. MINNS AND HIS COUSIN. 


87 


t first saw it, by Jove ! it looked so knowing, with the 
front garden, and the green railings, and the brass 
knocker, and all that — I really thought it was a cut 
above me.” 

“ Don’t you think you’d like the ham better,” inter- 
rupted Minns, “ if you cut it the other way ? ” He saw, 
w’ith feelings which it is impossible to describe, that his 
visitor was cutting or rather maiming the ham, in utter 
violation of all established rules. 

, “No, thank ye,” returned Budden, with the most bar- 
barous indifference to crime, “ I prefer it this way — it 
eats short. But I say Minns, when will you come down 
and see us ? You will be delighted with the place ; I 
know you will. Amelia and I were talking about you 
the other night, and Amelia said — another lump of 
sugar, please ; thank ye — she said, don’t you think you 
could contrive, my dear, to say to Mr. Minns, in a friend- 
ly way — come down, sir — damn the dog ! he’s spoiling 
your curtains, Minns — ha ! — ha ! — ha ! ” Minns leaped 
from his seat as though he had received the discharge 
from a galvanic battery. 

“ Come out, sir ! — go out, hoo ! ” cried poor Augustus, 
keeping nevertheless, at a very respectful distance from 
the dog ; having read of a case of hydrophobia in the 
paper of that morning. By dint of great exertion, much 
shouting, and a marvellous deal of poking under the 
tables with a stick and umbrella, the dog was at last 
dislodged, and placed on the landing outside the door, 
where he immediately commenced a most appalling howl- 
ing; at the same time vehemently scratching the paint 
off the two nicely varnished bottom panels, until they 
reseriibled the interior of a back-gammon board. 

“ A good dog for the country that ! ” coolly observed 


88 


SKE'J’CHES BY BOZ. 


Budden to the distracted Minns, “but he’s not much used 
to confinement. But now, Minns, when will you come 
down ? I’ll take no denial, positively. Let’s see, to- 
day’s Thursday. — Will you come on Sunday ? We dine 
at five, don’t say no — do.” 

After a great deal of pressing, Mr. Augustus Minns, 
driven to despair, accepted the invitation and promised 
to be at Poplar Walk on the ensuing Sunday, at a quar- 
ter before five to the minute. 

“ Now mind the direction,” said Budden : “ the coach 
goes from the Flower Pot, in Bishopsgate Street, every 
half hour. When the coach stops at the Swan, you’ll 
see, immediately opposite you, a white house.” 

“ Which is your house — I understand,” said Minns, 
wishing to cut short the visit, and the story, at the same 
time. 

“ No, no, that’s not mine ; that’s Grogus’s, the great 
ironmonger’s. I was going to say — you turn down by 
the side of the white house till you can’t go another step 
further — mind that ! — and then you turn to your right, 
by some stables — well ; close to you, you’ll see a wall 
with ‘ Beware of the Dog ’ written on it in large letters 
— (Minns shuddered) — go along by the side of that 
wall for about a quarter of a mile — and anybody will 
show you which is my place.” 

“ Very well — thank ye — good-by.” 

“ Be punctual.” 

“ Certainly : good morning.” 

“ I say, Minns, you’ve got a card.” 

“ Yes, I have : thank ye.” And Mr. Octavius Bud- 
den departed, leaving his cousin looking forward to his 
visit of the following Sunday, with the feelings of jb^peii- 
niless poet to the weekly visit of his Scotch landlady. 


MR. MINNS AND HIS COUSIN. 


89 


. Sunday arrived; the sky was bright and clear; crowds 
of people were hurrying along the streets, intent on their 
different schemes of pleasure for the day ; everything 
and everybody looked cheerful and happy except Mr. 
Augustus Minns. 

The day was fine, but the heat was considerable ; when 
JVlr Minns had fagged up the shady side of Fleet Street, 
Cheapside, and Threadneedle Street, he had become 
pretty warm, tolerably dusty, and it was getting late into 
the bargain. By the most extraordinary good fortune, 
however, a coach was waiting at the Flower Pot, into 
which Mr. Augustus Minns got, on the solemn assurance 
of the cad that the vehicle would start in three minutes 
— that being the very utmost extremity of time it was 
allowed to wait by Act of Parliament. A quarter of an 
hour elapsed, and there were no signs of moving. Minns 
looked at his watch for the sixth time. 

“ Coachman, are you going or not ? ” bawled Mr. 
Minns, with his head and half his body out of the 
coach-window. 

“ Di — rectly sir,” said the coachman, with his hands 
in his pockets, looking as much unlike a man in a hurry 
as possible. 

“ Bill, take them clothes off.” Five minutes more 
elapsed ; at the end of which time the coachman mounted 
the box, from whence he looked down the street, and up 
the street, and hailed all the pedestrians for another five 
minutes. 

“ Coachman ! if you don’t go this moment, I shall get 
out,” said Mr. Minns, rendered desperate by the lateness 
of the hour, and the impossibility of being in Poplar 
Walk at the appointed time. 

“ Going this minute, sir,” was the reply ; — and, ac- 


90 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


cordingly, the machine trundled on for a couple of hun- 
dred yards, and then stopped again. Minns doubled him- 
self up in a corner of the coach, and abandoned himself 
to his fate, as a child, a mother, a bandbox, and a parasol 
became his fellow-passengers. 

The child was an affectionate and an amiable infant ; 
the little dear mistook IMinns for his other parent, and 
screamed to embrace him. 

“ Be quiet, dear,” said the mamma, restraining the 
impetuosity of the darling, whose little fat legs were 
kicking, and stamping, and twining themselves into the 
most complicated forms in an ecstasy of impatience. 
“ Be quiet, dear, that’s not your papa.” 

“ Thank Heaven I am not ! ” thought Minns, as the 
first gleam of pleasure he had experienced that morning 
shone like a meteor through his wretchedness. 

Playfulness was agreeably mingled with affection in 
the disposition of the boy. When satisfied that Mr. 
Minns was not his parent, he endeavored to attract his 
notice by scraping his drab trousers with his dirty shoes, 
poking his chest with his mamma’s parasol, and other 
nameless endearments peculiar to infancy, with which he 
beguiled the tediousness of the ride, apparently very 
much to his own satisfaction. 

• When the unfortunate gentleman arrived at the Swan, 
he found to his great dismay that it was a quarter past 
five. The white house, the stables, the “ Beware of the 
Dog,” — every landmark was passed with a rapidity not 
unusual to a gentleman of a certain age when too late 
for dinner. After the lapse of a few minutes, Mr. Minns 
found himself opposite a yelloAv brick house with a green 
door, brass knocker and door-plate, green window-frames 
and ditto railings, v/ith “ a garden ” in front, that is to 


MR. MINNS AND HIS COUSIN. 


91 


Bay, a small loose bit of gravelled ground, with one round 
and two scalene triangular beds, containing a fir-tree, 
twenty or thirty bulbs, and an unlimited number of mari* 
golds. The taste of Mr. and Mrs. Budden was further 
displayed by the appearance of a Cupid on each side of 
the door, perched upon a heap of large chalk flints, varie- 
gated with pink conch-shells. His knock at the door was 
answered by a stumpy boy, in drab livery, cotton stock- 
ings, and high-lows, who, after hanging his hat on one of 
the dozen brass pegs which ornamented the passage, de- 
nominated by courtesy “ The Hall,” ushered him into a 
front drawing-room, commanding a very extensive view 
of the backs of the neighboring houses. The usual 
ceremony of introduction, and so forth, over, Mr. Minns 
took his seat : not a little agitated at finding that he was 
the last comer, and, somehow or other, the Lion of about 
a dozen people, sitting together in a small drawing-room, 
getting rid of that most tedious of all time, the time pre- 
ceding dinner. 

“ Well, Brogson,” said Budden, addressing an elderly 
gentleman in a black coat, drab knee-breeches, and long 
gaiters, who, under pretence of inspecting the prints in 
an Annual, had been engaged in satisfying himself on 
the subject of Mr. Minns’s general appearance, by look- 
ing at him over the tops of the leaves — “Well, Brog- 
son, what do Ministers mean to do ? Will they go out, 
or what ? ” 

“ Oh — why — really, you know, I’m the last person 
in the world to ask for news. Your cousin, from his 
situation, is tlie most likely person to answer the ques- 
tion.” 

Mr. Minns assured the last speaker, that although he 
was in Somerset House, he possessed no official commu- 


92 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


nication relative to the projects of his Majesty’s Minis- 
ters. But his remark was evidently received incredu- 
lously ; and no further conjectures being hazarded on the 
subject, a long pause ensued, during w^hich the company 
occupied themselves in coughing and blowing their 
noses, until the entrance of Mrs. Budden caused a gen- 
eral rise. 

The ceremony of introduction being over, dinner was 
announced, and down-stairs the party proceeded accord- 
ingly — Mr. Minns escorting Mrs. Budden as far as the 
drawing-room door, but being prevented, by the narrow- 
ness of the staircase, from extending his gallantry any 
farther. The dinner passed off as such dinners usually 
do. Ever and anon, amidst the clatter of knives and 
forks, and the hum of conversation, Mr. B.’s voice might 
be heard, asking a friend to take wine, and assuring him 
he was glad to see him ; and a great deal of by-play took 
place between Mrs. B. and the servants, respecting the 
removal of the dishes, during which her countenance 
assumed all the variations of a weather-glass, from 
“ stormy ” to “ set fair.” 

Upon the dessert and wine being placed on the table, 
the servant, in compliance with a significant look from 
Mrs. B., brought down “ Master Alexander,” habited in 
a sky-blue suit with silver buttons ; and possessing hair 
of nearly the same color as the metal. After sundry 
praises from his mother, and various admonitions as to 
Jbis behavior from his father, he was introduced to his 
godfather. 

“Well, my little fellow — you are a fine boy, a’n’t 
you ? ” said Mr. Minns, as happy as a tomtit on bird* 
lime. 

“Yes.” 


MR. MINNS AND HIS COUSIN. 


93 


“ How old are you ? ” 

“ Eight, next We’nsday. How old are you'^” 

“ Alexander,” interrupted his mother, “ how dare you 
ask Mr. Minns how old he is ! ” 

“ He asked me how old I was,” said the precocious 
child, to whom Minns had from that moment internally 
resolved that he never would bequeath one shilling. As 
soon as the titter occasioned by the observation had sub- 
sided, a little smirking man with red whiskers, sitting at 
the bottom of the table, who during the whole dinner had 
been endeavoring to obtain a listener to some stories 
about Sheridan, called out, with a very patronizing air 
— “ Alick, what part of speech is be ? ” 

“ A verb.” 

“ That’s a good boy,” said Mrs. Budden with all a 
mother’s pride. “ Now, you know what a verb is ? ” 

“ A verb is a word which signifies to be, to do, or to 
suffer ; as, I am — I rule — I am ruled. Give me an 
apple, Ma.” 

“ I’ll give you an apple,” replied the man with the red 
whiskers, who was an established friend of the family, 
or in other words was always invited by Mrs. Budden, 
whether Mr. Budden liked it or not, “ if you’ll tell mo 
what is the meaning of be.’* 

“ Be ^ ” said the prodigy, after a little hesitation — 
“ an insect that gathers honey.” 

“ No, dear,” frowned Mrs. Budden ; “ B double E is 
he substantive.” 

“ I don’t think he knows much yet about common sub- 
stantives,” said the smirking gentleman, who thought this 
<10 admirable opportunity for letting off a joke. “ It’s 
clear he’s not very well acquainted with proper names. 
He! He! He!” 


94 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


“ Gentlemen,” called out IVIr. Budden, from the end o( 
the table, in a stentorian voice, and with a very impor- 
tant air, “will you have the goodness to charge your 
glasses ? I have a toast to propose.” 

“ Hear ! hear ! ” cried the gentlemen, passing the de- 
canters. After they had made the round of the table, 
Mr. Budden proceeded — “ Gentlemen ; there is an indi- 
vidual present — ” 

“ Hear ! hear ! ” said the little man with red whis- 
kers. 

“ Pray be quiet, Jones,” remonstrated Budden. 

“ I say, gentlemen, there is an individual present,” 
resumed the host, “ in whose society, I am sure we must 
take great delight — and — and — the conversation of that 
individual must have afforded to every one present the 
utmost pleasure.” [“ Thank Heaven, he does not mean 
me ! ” thought Minns, conscious that his diffidence and 
exclusiveness had prevented his saying above a dozen 
words since he entered the house.] “ Gentlemen, I am 
but a humble individual myself, and I perhaps ought to 
apologize for allowing any individual feelings of friend- 
ship and affection for the person I allude to, to induce 
me to venture to rise, to propose the health of that per- 
son — a person that I am sure — that is to say, a person 
whose virtues must endear him to those who know him 
. — and those who have not the pleasure of knowing him, 
cannot dislike him.” 

“ Hear ! hear ! ” said the company, in a tone of en- 
couragement and approval. 

“ Gentlemen,” continued Budden, “ my cousin is a man 
who — who is a relation of my own.” (Hear ! hear !) 
Minns groaned audibly. “ Who I am most happy to see 
Here, and who, if he were .not here, would certainly have 


MR. MIIfNS AND HIS COUSIN. 


95 


deprived us of the great pleasure we all feel in seeing 
him. (Loud cries of hear !) Gentlemen, I feel that I 
have already trespassed on your attention for too long a 
time. With every feeling — of — with every sentiment 
of — of— ” 

“ Gratification ” — suggested the friend of the family. 

“ — Of gratification, I beg to propose the health of 
Mr. Minns.” 

“ Standing, gentlemen ! ” shouted the indefatigable little 
man with the whiskers — “ and with the honors. Take 
your time from me, if you please. Hip! hip! hip! — 
Za ! — Hip ! hip ! hip ! — Za ! — Hip ! hip ! — Za — a 
— a!” 

All eyes were now fixed on the subject of the toast, 
who by gulping down port-wine at the imminent hazard 
of suffocation, endeavored to conceal his confusion. 
After as long a pause as decency would admit, he rose, 
but, as the newspapers sometimes say in their reports,' 
“ we regret that we Avere quite unable to give even the sub- 
stance of the honorable gentleman’s observations.” .The 
words “ present company — honor — present occasion,” 
and “ great happiness ” — heard occasionally, and repeat* 
ed at intervals, Avith a countenance expressive of the 
utmost confusion and misery, convinced the company that 
he was making an excellent speech ; and, accordingly, 
on his resuming his seat, they cried “ Bravo ! ” and mani- 
fested tumultuous applause. Jones, Avho had been long 
watching his opportunity, then darted up. 

* “ Budden,” said he, “ Avill you allow me to propose a 

toast ? ” 

“ Certainly,” replied Budden, adding in an undertone 
to Minns right across the table. “ Devilish sharp fellow 
that : you’ll be very much pleased with his speech. He 


96 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


t 

talks equally well on any subject.” Minns bowed, and 
Mr. Jones proceeded : — 

“ It has on several occasions, in various instances, un- 
der many circumstances, and in different companies, fallen 
to my lot to propose a toast to those by whom, at the 
time, I have had the honor to be surrounded. I have 
sometimes, I will cheerfully own — for why should I 
deny it ? — felt the overwhelming nature of the task I 
have undertaken, and my own utter incapability to do 
justice to the subject. If such have been my feelings, 
however, on former occasions, what must they be now — 
now — under the extraordinary circumstances in which 
I am placed. (Hear ! hear !) To describe my feelings 
accurately, would be impossible ; but I cannot give you 
a better idea of them, gentlemen, than by referring to a 
circumstance which happens, oddly enough, to occur to 
my mind at the moment. On one occasion, when that 
truly great and illustrious man, Sheridan, was — ” 

Now, there is no knowing what new villany in the 
form of a joke would have been heaped on the grave of 
that very ill-used man, Mr. Sheridan, if the boy in drab 
had not at that moment entered the room in a breathless 
state, to report that, as it was a very wet night, the nine 
o’clock stage had come round, to know whether there 
was anybody going to town, as, in that case, he (the nine 
0 clock) had room for one inside. 

Mr. Minns started up ; and, despite countless exclama- 
tions of surprise, and entreaties to stay, persisted in his 
determination to accept the vacant place. But the brown 
silk umbrella was nowhere to be found ; and as the coach- 
man couldn’t wait, he drove back to the Swan, leaving 
word for Mr. Minns to “run round” and catch him. 
However, as it did not occur to Mr. Minns for some ten 


SENTIMENT. 


97 


minutes or so, that he had left the brown silk umbrella 
with the ivory handle in the other coach, coming down ; 
and, moreover, as he was by no means remarkable for 
speed, it is no matter of surprise that when he accom- 
plished the feat of “running round” to the Swan, the 
coach — the last coach — had gone without him. 

It was somewhere about three o’clock in the morning, 
when Mr. Augustus Minns knocked feebly at the street- 
door of his lodgings in Tavistock Street, cold, wet, cross, 
and miserable. He made his will next morning, and his 
professional man informs us, in that strict confidence in 
which we inform the public, that neither the name of Mr. 
Octavius Budden, nor of Mrs. Amelia Budden, nor of 
Master Alexander Augustus Budden, appears therein. 


CHAPTER m. 

SENTIMENT. 

The Miss Crumptons, or to quote the authority of the 
inscription on the garden-gate of Minerva House, Ham- 
mersmith, “ The Misses Crumpton,” were two unusually 
tall, particularly thin, and exceedingly skinny person- 
ages ; very upright, and very yellow. Miss Amelia 
Crumpton owned to thirty - eight, and Miss Maria 
Crumpton admitted she was forty ; an admission which 
was rendered perfectly unnecessary by the self-evident 
fact of her being at least fifty. They dressed in the 
most interesting manner — like twins ; and looked as 
laappy and comfortable as a couple of marigolds run to 

VOL. II. 7 


98 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


seed. They were very precise, had the strictest possible 
ideas of propriety, wore false hair, and always smelt very 
strongly of lavender. 

Minerva House, conducted under the auspices of the 
two sisters, was a “finishing establishment for young 
ladies, where some twenty girls of the ages of from thir- 
teen to nineteen inclusive, acquired a smattering of 
everything, and a knowledge of nothing ; instruction in 
French and Italian, dancing-lessons twice a week ; and 
other necessaries of life. The house was a white one, a 
little removed from the roadside, with close palings in 
front. The bedroom windows were always left partly 
open, to afford a bird’s-eye view of numerous little bed- 
steads with very white dimity furniture, and thereby im- 
press the passer-by with a due sense of the luxuries of 
the establishment; and there was a front parlor hung 
round with highly varnished maps which nobody ever 
looked at, and filled with books which no one ever read, 
appropriated exclusively to the reception of parents, who, 
whenever they called, could not fail to be struck with the 
very deep appearance of the place. 

“ Amelia, my dear,” said Miss Maria Crumpton, enter- 
ing the school-room one morning, with her false hair in 
papers : as she occasionally did, in order to impress the 
young ladies with a conviction of its reality. “ Amelia, 
my dear, here is a most gratifying note I have just re- 
ceived. You needn’t mind reading it aloud.” 

Miss Amelia, thus advised, proceeded to read the fol- 
lowing note with an air of great triumph : — 

“ Cornelius Brook Dingwall, Esq., M. P., presents his 
compliments to Miss Crumpton, and will feel much 
obliged by Miss Crumpton’s calling on him, if she con- 


SENTIMENT. 


99 


leniently can, to-morrow morning at one o’clock, as Cor- 
nelius Brook Dingwall, Esq., M. P., is anxious to see 
Miss Crumpton on the subject of placing IVIiss Brook 
Dingwall under her charge. 

“ Adelphi, 

“ Monday morning.” 

A Member of Parliament’s daughter ! ” ejaculated 
Amelia, in an ecstatic tone. 

“ A Member of Parliament’s daughter ! ” repeated Miss 
INIaria, with a smile of delight, which, of course, elicited 
a concurrent titter of pleasure from all the young ladies. 

“ It’s exceedingly delightful ! ” said Miss Amelia ; 
whereupon all the young ladies murmured their admira- 
tion again. Courtiers are but school-boys, and court- 
ladies school-girls. 

So important an announcement at once superseded the 
business of the day. A holiday was declared, in com- 
memoration of the great event ; the Miss Crumptons 
retired to their private apartment to talk it over; the 
smaller girls discussed the probable manners and customs 
of the daughter of a Member of Parliament; and the 
young ladies verging on eighteen wondered whether she 
was engaged, whether she was pretty, whether she wore 
much bustle, and many other whethers of equal impor- 
tance. 

The two Miss Crumptons proceeded to the Adelphi at 
the appointed time next day, dressed, of course, in their 
best style, and looking as amiable as they possibly could 
■ — which, by the by, is not saying much for them. Hav- 
ing sent in their cards, through the medium of a red-hot 
booking footman in bright livery, they were ushered into 
the august presence of the profound Dingwall. 


100 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


Cornelius Brook Dingwall, Esq., M. P., was very 
haughty, solemn, and portentous. He had, naturally, a 
somewhat spasmodic expression of countenance, which 
was not rendered the less remai'kable by his wearing an 
extremely stiff cravat. He was wonderfully proud of 
the M. P. attached to his name, and never lost an oppor- 
tunity of reminding people of his dignity. He had a 
great idea of his own abilities, which must have been a 
great comfort to him, as no one else had ; and in di- 
plomacy, on a small scale, in his own family arrange- 
ments, he considered himself unrivalled. He was a 
county magistrate, and dischai'ged the duties of his sta- 
tion with all due justice and impartiality; frequently 
committing poachers, and occasionally committing him- 
self. Miss Brook Dingwall was one of that numerous 
class of young ladies, who, like adverbs, may be known 
by their answering to a commonplace question, and 
doing nothing else. 

On the present occasion, this talented individual was 
seated in a small library at a table covered with papers, 
doing nothing, but trying to look busy — playing at shop. 
Acts of Parliament, and letters directed to “ Cornelius 
Brook Dingwall, Esq., M. P.,” were ostentatiously scat- 
tered over the table ; at a little distance from which, 
Mrs. Brook Dingwall was seated at work. One of those 
public nuisances, a spoiled child, was playing about the 
room, dressed after the most approved fashion — in a 
blue tunic with a black belt a quarter of a yard wide, 
festened with an immense buckle — looking like a robber 
m a melodrama, seen through a diminishing glass. 

After a little pleasantry from the sweet child, who 
amused himself by running away with Miss Maria 
Crumpton’s chair as fast as it was placed for her, the 


% 


SENTIMENT. 


101 


visitors were seated, and Cornelius Brook Dingwall, 
Esq., opened the conversation. 

He had sent for Miss Crumpton, he said, in conse- 
quence of the high character he had received of her 
establishment from his friend Sir Alfred Muggs. 

Miss Crumpton murmured her acknowledgments to 
him (Muggs), and Cornelius proceeded. 

“One of my principal reasons, Miss Crumpton, for 
parting with my daughter, is, that she has lately ac- 
quired some sentimental ideas, which it is most desirable 
to eradicate from her young mind.” (Here the little in- 
nocent before noticed fell out of an arm-chair with an 
awful crash.) 

“ Naughty boy ! ” said his mamma, who appeared more 
surprised at his taking the liberty of falling down, than at 
anything else ; “ I’ll ring the bell for James to take him 
away.” 

“ Pray don’t check him, my love,” said the diplomatist, 
as soon as he could make himself heard amidst the un- 
earthly howling consequent upon the threat and the 
tumble. “ It all arises from his great flow of spirits.” 
This last explanation was addressed to Miss Crumpton. 

“ Certainly, sir,” replied the antique Maria : not exactly 
seeing, however, the connection between a flow of animal 
spirits and a fall from an arm-chair. 

Silence was restored, and the M. P. resumed : “ Now, 
I know nothing so likely to effect this object, Miss 
Crumpton, as her mixing constantly in the society of 
girls of her own age ; and, as I know that in your estab- 
lishment she will meet such as are not likely to contami- 
nate her young mind, I propose to send her to you.” 

The youngest Miss Crumpton expressed the acknowl- 
edgments of the establishment generally. Maria was 


102 


SKEI'CHES BY BOZ. 


rendered speechless by bodily pain. The dear little fel- 
low, having recovered his animal spirits, was standing 
upon her most tender foot, by way of getting his face 
(which looked like a capital O in a red-lettered play-bill) 
on a level with the writing-table. 

“ Of course^ Lavinia will be a parlor boarder,” con- 
tinued the enviable father ; “ and on one point I wish 
my directions to be strictly observed. The fact is, that 
some ridiculous love affair, with a person much her infe- 
rior in life, has been the cause of her present state of 
mind. Knowing that of course, under your care, she 
can have no opportunity of meeting this person, I do not 
object to — indeed, I should rather prefer — her mixing 
with such society as you see yourself.” 

This important statement was again interrupted by the 
high-spirited little creature, in the excess of his joyous- 
ness breaking a pane of glass, and nearly precipitating 
himself into an adjacent area. James was rung for; 
considerable confusion and screaming succeeded ; twm 
little blue legs w^ere seen to kick violently in the air as 
the man left the room, and the child was gone. 

“ Mr. Brook Dingwall would like Miss Brook Ding- 
wall to learn everything,” said Mrs. Brook Dingwall, 
who hardly ever said anything at all. 

“ Certainly,” said both the Miss Crumptons together. 

“ And as I trust the plan I have devised will be effect- 
ual in w^eaning my daughter from this absurd idea. Miss 
Crumpton,” continued the legislator, “ I hope you will 
have tlie goodness to comply, in all respects, with any 
request I may forward to you.” 

The promise was of course made, and after a length- 
ened discussion, conducted on behalf of the Ding^^alls 
with the most becoming diplomatic gravity, and on that 


SENTiaiENT. 


108 


uf the Crumptons with profound respect, it was finally 
arranged that Miss Lavinia should be forwarded to 
Hammersmith on the next day but one, on which occa- 
sion the half-yearly ball given at the establishment was 
to take place. It might divert the dear girl’s mind. 
This, by the way, was another bit of diplomacy. 

Miss Lavinia was introduced to her future governess, 
and both the Miss Crumptons pronounced her “ a most 
charming girl ; ” an opinion which, by a singular coinci- 
dence, they always entertained of any new pupil. 

Courtesies were exchanged, acknowledgments ex- 
pressed, condescension exhibited, and the interview 
terminated. 

Preparations, to make use of theatrical phraseology, 
“ on a scale of magnitude never before attempted,” were 
incessantly made at Minerva House to give every effect 
to the forthcoming ball. The largest room in the house 
Avas pleasingly ornamented witli blue calico roses, plaid 
tulips, and other equally natural-looking artificial flowers, 
the work of the young ladies themselves. The carpet 
was taken up, the folding-doors were taken down, the 
furniture was taken out, and rout-seats were taken in. 
The linen-drapers of Hammersmith were astounded at 
the sudden demand for blue sarsenet ribbon, and long 
white gloves. Dozens of geraniums were purchased for 
bouquets, and a harp and two violins were bespoke from 
town, in addition to the grand piano already on the prem 
ises. The young ladies who were selected to show off' 
on tlie occasion, and do credit to the establishment, prac- 
tised incessantly, much to their own satisfaction, and 
gi-eatl}" to the annoyance of the lame old gentleman over 
the way ; and a constant correspondence was kept up, 
between the Misses Crumpton and the Hammersmith 
pastrycook. 


104 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


The evening came ; and then there was such a lacing 
of stays, and a tying of sandals, and dressing of hair, as 
never can take place with a proper degree of bustle out 
of a boarding-school. The smaller girls managed to be 
in everybody’s way, and were pushed about accordingly ; 
and the elder ones dressed, and tied, and flattered, and 
envied, one another, as earnestly and sincerely as if they 
had actually come out. 

" How do I look, dear ? ” inquired Miss Emily Smith- 
ers, the belle of the house, of Miss Caroline Wilson, who 
was her bosom friend, because she was the ugliest girl in 
Hammersmith, or out of it. 

“ Oh ! charming, dear. How do I ? ” 

“ Delightful ! you never looked so handsome,” returned 
the belle, adjusting her own dress, and not bestowing a 
glance on her poor companion. 

“ I hope young Hilton will come early,” said another 
young lady to Miss somebody else, in a fever of expecta- 
tion. 

“ I’m sure he’d be highly flattered if he knew it,” re- 
turned the other, who was practising Vke. 

“ Oh ! he’s so handsome,” said the first. 

“ Such a charming person ! ” added a second. 

“ Such a distingue air ; ” said a third. 

“ Oh, what do you think ? ” said another girl, running 
into the room ; “ Miss Crumpton says her cousin’s com- 
ing.” 

“ What ! Theodosius Butler ? ” said everybody in 
raptures. 

“ Is he handsome ? ” inquired a novice. 

“ No, not particularly handsome,” was the general 
reply ; “ but, oh, so clever ! ” 

Mr. Theodosius Butler was one of those immortal 


SENTIMENT. 


105 


geniuses who are to be met with, in almost every circle. 
They have, usually, very deep monotonous voices. They 
always persuade themselves that they are wonderful per- 
sons, and that they ought to be very miserable, though 
they don’t precisely know why. They are very con- 
ceited, and usually possess half an idea ; but, with en- 
thusiastic young ladies, and silly young gentlemen, they 
are very wonderful persons. The individual in question, 
Mr. Theodosius, had written a pamphlet containing some 
very weighty considerations on the expediency of doing 
something or other ; and as every sentence contained a 
good many words of four syllables, his admirers took it 
for granted that he meant a good deal. 

“ Perhaps that’s he,” exclaimed several young ladies, 
as the first pull of the evening threatened destruction to 
the bell of the gate. 

An awful pause ensued. Some boxes arrived and a 
young lady — Miss Brook Dingwall, in full ball cos- 
tume, with an immense gold chain round her neck, and 
her dress looped up with a single rose ; an ivory fan in 
her hand, and a most interesting expression of despair in 
her face. 

The Miss Crumptons inquired after the family with 
the most excruciating anxiety, and Miss Brook Dingwall 
was formally introduced to her future companions. The 
Miss Crumptons conversed with the young ladies in the 
nost mellifluous tones, in order that Miss Brook Ding- 
wall might be properly impressed with their amiable 
trefitment. 

Another pull at the bell. Mr. Dadson the writing 
master, and his wife. The wife in green silk, with shoes 
and cap-trimmings to correspond ; the writing-master in 
a white waistcoat, black knee-siiorts, and ditto silk stock- 


106 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


ings, displaying a leg large enough for two writing-mas- 
ters. The young ladies whispered one another, and the 
writing-master and his wife flattered the Miss Crump- 
tons, whc were dressed in amber, with long sashes, like 
dolls. 

Repeated pulls at the bell, and arrivals too numerous 
to particularize : papas and mammas, and aunts and un- 
cles, the owners and guardians of the different pupils ; 
tlie singing-master. Signor Lobskini, in a black wig ; the 
piano-forte player and the violins ; the harp, in a state of 
intoxication ; and some twenty young men, who stood 
near tlie door, and talked to one another, occasionally 
bursting into a giggle. A general hum of conversation. 
Coffee handed round, and plentifully partaken of by fat 
mammas, who looked like the stout people who come on 
in pantomimes for the sole purpose of being knocked 
down. 

The popular Mr. Hilton was the next arrival ; and he 
having, at the request of the Miss Crumptons, imder- 
taken the office of Master of the Ceremonies, the qua- 
drilles commenced with considerable sph’it. The young 
men by the door gradually advanced into the middle of 
the room, and in time became sufficiently at ease to con- 
sent to be introduced to partner’s. The writing-master 
danced every set, springing about with the most fearful 
agility, and his wife played a rubber in the back-parlor 
— a little room with five book-shelves, dignified by the 
name of the study. Setting her down to whist was a 
half-yearly piece of generalship on the part of the Miss 
Crumptons ; it was necessary to hide her somewhere, on 
account of her being a fright. 

The interesting Lavinia Brook Dingwall was the only 
girl present, who appeared to take no interest in the pro- 


SENTIMENT. 


107 


cecdings of the evening. In vain was she solicited to 
dance ; in vain was the universal homage paid to her as 
the daughter of a member of parliament. She was 
equally unmoved by the splendid tenor of the inimitable 
Lobskini, and the brilliant execution of Miss Laetitia 
Parsons, whose performance of “ The Recollections of 
Ireland ” was universally declared to be almost equal to 
that of Moscheles himself. Not even the announcement 
of the arrival of Mr. Theodosius Butler could induce her 
to leave the comer of the back drawing-room in which 
she was seated. 

“ Now, Theodosius,” said Miss Maria Crumpton, after 
that enlightened pamphleteer had nearly run the gaunt- 
let of the whole company, “I must introduce you to ouj 
new pupil.” 

Theodosius looked as if he cared for nothing earthly. 

“ She’s the daughter of a member of parliament,” said 
Maria. — Theodosius started. 

“ And her name is — ? ” he inquired. 

“ Miss Brook Dingwall.” 

“ Great Heaven ! ” poetically exclaimed Theodosius, i^k 
a low tone. 

Miss Crumpton commenced the introduction in due 
form. Miss Brook Dingwall languidly raised her 
head. 

“ Edward ! ” she exclaimed, with a half-shriek, on see- 
ing the well-known nankeen legs. 

Fortunately, as Miss Maria Crumpton possessed no 
remarkable share of penetration, and as it was one of the 
diplomatic arrangements that no attention was to be paid 
to Miss Lavinia’s incoherent exclamations, she was per- 
fectly unconscious of the mutual agitation of the parties ; 
and therefore, seeing that the offer of his hand for the 


108 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


next quadrille, was accepted, she left him by the side of 
Miss Brook Dingwall. 

“ Oh, Edward ! ” exclaimed that most romantic of all 
romantic young ladies, as the light of science seated 
liimself beside her, “ Oh, Edward, is it you ? ” 

Mr. Theodosius assured the dear creature, in the most 
impassioned manner, that he was not conscious of being 
anybody but himself. 

“ Then why — why — this disguise ? Oh ! Edward 
M’Neville Walter, what have I not suffered on your 
account ? ” 

“ Lavinia, hear me,” replied the hero, in his most poetic 
strain. “ Do not condemn me, unheard. If anything 
that emanates from the soul of such a wretch as I, can 
occupy a place in your recollection — if any being, so 
vile, deserve your notice — you may remember that I 
once published a pamphlet (and paid for its publication) 
entitled ‘ Considerations on the Policy of Removing the 
Duty on Beeswax.’ ” 

“ I do — I do ! ” sobbed Lavinia. 

“ That,” continued the lover, “ was a subject to which 
your father was devoted heart and soul.” 

“ He was — he was ! ” reiterated the sentimentalist. 

“ I knew it,” continued Theodosius, tragically ; “ I 
knew it — I forwarded him a copy. He wished to know 
me. Could I disclose my real name ? Never ! No, I 
assumed that name which you have so often pronounced 
in tones of endearment. As M’Neville Walter, I devoted 
myself to the stirring cause ; as M’Neville Walter, I 
gained your heart ; in the same character I was ejected 
from your house by your father’s domestics ; and in no 
character at all have I since been enabled to see you. 
We now meet again, and I proudly own that I am — 
Theodosius Butler.” 


SENTIMENT. 


109 


The young lady appeared perfectly satisfied with this 
argumentative address, and bestowed a look of the most 
ai’dent affection on the immortal advocate of beeswax. 

May I hope,” said he, “ that the promise your father’s 
violent behavior interrupted, may be renewed ? ” 

“ Let us join this set,” replied Lavinia, coquettishly 
■ — for girls of nineteen can coquet. 

“ No,” ejaculated he of the nankeens ; “ I stir not from 
this spot, writhing under this torture of suspense. May 
I — may I — hope ? ” 

You may.” 

“ The promise is renewed ? ” 

«Itis.” 

“ I have your permission ? ” 

You have.” 

“ To the fullest extent ? ” 

“ You know it,” returned the blushing Lavinia. The 
contortions of the interesting Butler’s visage expressed 
his raptures. 

We could dilate upon the occurrences that ensued. 
How Mr. Theodosius and Miss Lavinia danced, and 
talked, and sighed for the remainder of the evening — 
how the Miss Crumptons were delighted thereat. How 
the writing-master continued to frisk about with one- 
horse power, and how his wife, from some unaccountable 
freak, left the whist-table in the little back-parlor, and 
persisted in displaying her green head-dress in the most 
conspicuous part of the drawing-room. How the supper 
consisted of small triangular sandwiches in trays, and a 
tart here and there by way of variety ; and how the visit- 
ors consumed warm water disguised with lemon, and dotted 
with nutmeg, under the denomination of negus. These, 
and other matters of as much interest, however, we pass 


110 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


over, for the purpose of describing a scene of even more 
importance. 

A fortnight after the date of the ball, Cornelius Brook 
Dingwall, Esq., M. P., was seated at the same library 
table, and in the same room, as we have before described. 
He was alone, and his face bore an expression of deep 
thought and solemn gravity — he was drawing up “ A 
Bill for the better observance of Easter Monday.” 

The footman tapped at the door — the legislator started 
from his reverie, and “ Miss Crumpton ” was announced. 
Permission was given for Miss Crumpton to enter the 
sanctum ; Maria came sliding in, and having taken her 
seat with a due portion of affectation, the footman retired, 
and the governess was left alone with the M. P. Oh ; 
how she longed for the presence of a third party ! Even 
the facetious young gentleman would have been a relief. 

Miss Crumpton began the duet. She hoped Mrs. 
Brook Dingwall and the handsome little boy were in 
good health. 

They were. Mrs. Brook Dingwall and little Frederick 
were at Brighton. 

“ Much obliged to you. Miss Crumpton,” said Corne- 
lius, in his most dignified manner, “ for your attention in 
calling this morning. I should have driven down to 
Hammersmith, to see Lavinia, but your account was so 
very satisfactory, and my duties in the House occupy me 
so much, that I determined to postpone it for a week. 
How has she gone on ? ” 

“ Very well indeed, sir,” returned Maria, dreading to 
inform the father that she had gone off. 

“ Ah, I thought the plan on which I proceeded would 
DC a match for her.” 

Here was a favorable opportunity to say that some- 


SENTIMENT. 


Ill 


body else had been a match for her. But the unfortunate 
governess was unequal to the task. 

You have persevered strictly in the line of conduct 
I prescribed, Miss Crumpton ? ” 

“ Strictly, sir.” 

“ You tell me in your note that her spirits gradually 
improved.” 

“ Very much indeed, sir.” 

“ To be sure. I was convinced they would.” * 

“ But I fear, sir,” said Miss Crumpton, with visible 
emotion, “ I fear the plan has not succeeded quite so 
well as we could have wished.” 

“ No ! ” exclaimed the prophet. “ Bless me ! Miss 
Crumpton, you look alarmed. What has happened ? ” 

“ Miss Brook Dingwall, sir — ” 

Yes, ma’am ? ” 

“ Has gone, sir ” — said Maria, exhibiting a strong in- 
clination to faint. 

“ Gone ! ” 

“ Eloped, sir.” 

“ Eloped ! — Who with — when — where — how ? ” 
almost shrieked the agitated diplomatist. 

The natural yellow of the unfortunate Maria’s face 
changed to all the hues of the rainbow, as she laid a 
small packet on the member’s table. 

He hurriedly opened it. A letter from his daughter, 
and another from Theodosius. He glanced over their 
contents — “ Ere this reaches you, far distant — appea 
to feelings — love to distraction — beeswax — slavery,” 
&c., &c. He dashed his hand to his forehead, and paced 
the room with fearfully long strides, to the great alarm 
of the precise Maria. 

“ Now mind ; from this time forward,” said Mr. Brook 


112 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


Dingwall, suddenly stopping at the table, and beating 
time upon it with his hand ; “ from this time forward, I 
never will, under any circumstances whatever, permit a 
man who writes pamphlets to enter any ether room of 
this house but the kitchen. — I’ll allow my daughter and 
her husband one hundred and fifty pounds a-year, and 
never see their faces again ; and, damme ! ma’am. I’ll 
bring in a bill for the abolition of finishing-schools ! ” 

Some time has elapsed since this passionate declara- 
tion. Mr. and Mrs. Butler are at present rusticating in 
a small cottage at Ball’s Pond, pleasantly situated in the 
immediate vicinity of a brick-field. They have no 
family. Mr. Theodosius looks very important, and 
writes incessantly ; but, in consequence of a gross com- 
bination on the part of publishers, none of his produc- 
tions appear in print. His young wife begins to think 
that ideal misery is preferable to real unhappiness ; and 
that a marriage, contracted in haste, and repented at 
leisure, is the cause of more substantial wretchedness 
than she ever anticipated. 

On cool reflection, Cornelius Brook Dingwall, Esq., 
M. P., was reluctantly compelled to admit that the un- 
toward result of his admirable arrangements was attribu- 
table, not to the Miss Crumptons, but his own diplomacy. 
He however consoles himself, like some other small 
diplomatists, by satisfactorily proving that if his plans 
did not succeed, they ought to have done so. Minerva 
House is in statu quo, and “ The Misses Crumpton ” re- 
main in the peaceable and undisturbed enjoyment of all 
the advantages resulting from their Finishing-School. 


THE TUGGS’S AT RAMSGATE. 


118 


* CHAPTER IV. 

THE TUGGS’S AT RAMSGATE. 

Once upon a time, tliere dwelt, in a narrow street on 
the Surrey side of the water, within three minutes’ walk 
of old London Bridge, Mr. Joseph Tuggs — a little 
dark-faced man, with shiny hair, twinkling eyes, short 
legs, and a body of very considerable thickness, measur- 
ing from the centre button of his waistcoat in front, to 
the ornamental buttons of his coat behind. The figure 
of the amiable Mrs. Tuggs, if not perfectly symmetrical, 
was decidedly comfortable ; and the form of her only 
daughter, the accomplished Miss Charlotte Tuggs, was 
fast ripening into that state of luxuriant plumpness 
which had enchanted the eyes, and captivated the heart, 
of Mr. Joseph Tuggs in his earlier days. Mr. Simon 
Tuggs, his only son, and Miss Charlotte Tuggs’s only 
brother, was as differently formed in body, as he was 
differently constituted in mind, from the remainder of 
his family. There was that elongation in his thoughtful 
face, and that tendency to weakness in his interesting 
legs, which tell so forcibly of a great mind and romantic 
disposition. The slightest traits of character in such a 
being possess no mean interest to speculative minds. He 
usually appeared in public, in capacious shoes with 
black cotton stockings ; and was observed to be particu- 
larly attached to a black glazed stock,, without tie or 
ornament of any description. 

There is, perhaps, no profession, however useful ; no 

VOL. TI. 8 


114 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


pursuit, however meritorious ; which can escape the 
petty attacks of vulgar minds. Mr. Joseph Tuggs was 
a grocer. It might be supposed that a grocer was be- 
yond the breath of calumny ; but no — the neighbors 
stigmatized him as a chandler ; and the poisonous voice 
of envy distinctly asserted that he dispensed tea and 
coffee by the quartern, retailed sugar by the ounce, 
cheese by the slice, tobacco by the screw, and butter by 
the pat. These taunts, however, were lost upon the 
Tuggs’s. Mr. Tuggs attended to the grocery depart- 
ment ; Mrs. Tuggs to the cheesemongery ; and Miss 
Tuggs to her education. Mr. Simon Tuggs kept his 
father’s books, and his own counsel. 

One fine spring afternoon, the latter gentleman was 
seated on a tub of weekly Dorset, behind the little red 
desk with a wooden rail, which ornamented a corner of 
the counter ; when a stranger dismounted from a cab, 
and hastily entered the shop. He was habited in black 
cloth, and bore with him a green umbrella, and a blue 
bag. 

“Mr. Tuggs?” said the stranger, inquiringly, 
name is Tuggs,” replied Mr. Simon. 

“ It’s the other Mr. Tuggs,” said the stranger, looking 
towards the glass door which led into the parlor behind 
the shop, and on the inside of which, the round face of 
Mr. Tuggs, senior, was distinctly visible, peeping over 
the curtain. 

Mr. Simon gracefully waved his pen, as if in intima- 
tion of his wish that his father would advance. Mr. 
Joseph Tuggs, with considerable celerity, removed his 
face from the curtain, and placed it before the stranger. 

“I come from the Temple,” said the man with the 

bag. 


THE TUGGS’S AT RAMSGATE. 


115 


“ From the Temple ! ” said Mrs. Tuggs, flinging open 
the door of the little parlor and disclosing Miss Tuggs 
in perspective. 

“ From the Temple ! ” said Miss Tuggs and Mr. Simon 
Tuggs at the same moment. 

“ From the Temple ! ” said Mr. Joseph Tuggs, turn- 
ing as pale as a Dutch cheese. 

“ From the Temple,” repeated the man -with the bag ; 
“ from Mr. Gower’s, the solicitor’s. Mr. Tuggs, I con- 
gratulate you, sir. Ladies, I wish you joy of your pros- 
perity ! We have been successful.” And the man with 
the bag leisurely divested himself of his umbrella and 
glove, as a preliminary to shaking hands with Mr. Joseph 
Tuggs. 

Now the words “ we have been successful ” had no 
sooner issued from the mouth of the man with the bag, 
than Mr. Simon Tuggs rose from the tub of weekly Dor- 
set, opened his eyes very wide, gasped for breath, made 
figures of eight in the air with his pen, and finally fell 
into the arms of his anxious mother, and fainted away, 
without the slightest ostensible cause or pretence. 

“ Water ! ” screamed Mrs. Tuggs. 

“ Look up, my son,” exclaimed Mr. Tuggs. 

“ Simon ! dear Simon ! ” shrieked Miss Tuggs. 

I’m better now,” said Mr. Simon Tuggs. “ What ! 
successful ! ” And then, as corroborative evidence of 
his being better, he fainted away again, and was borne 
into the little parlor by the united efforts of the remain- 
der of the family, and the man with the bag. 

To a casual spectator, or to any one unacquainted with 
the position of the family, this fainting would have been 
unaccountable. To those who understood the mission of 
the man with the bag, and were moreover acquainted 


116 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


with the excitability of the nerves of Mr. Simon Tuggs, 
it was quite comprehensible. A long-pending lawsuit 
respecting the validity of a will, had been unexpectedly 
decided ; and Mr. Joseph Tuggs was the possessor of 
twenty thousand pounds. 

A prolonged consultation took place that night, in the 
little parlor — a consultation that was to settle the future 
destinies of the Tuggs’s. The shop was shut up at an 
unusually early hour ; and many were the unavailing 
kicks bestowed upon the closed door by applicants for 
quarterns of sugar, or half-quarterns of bread, or penn’- 
orths of pepper, which were to have been “ left till Sat- 
urday,” but which fortune had decreed were to be left 
alone altogether. 

“We must certainly give up business,” said Miss 
Tuggs. 

“ Oh, decidedly,” said Mrs. Tuggs. 

“ Simon shall go to the bar,” said Mr. Joseph Tuggs. 

“ And I shall always sign myself ‘ Cymon ’ in future,” 
said his son. 

“ And I shall call myself Charlotta,” said Miss Tuggs. 

“ And you must always call me ‘ Ma,’ and father ‘ Pa,’ ” 
said Mrs. Tuggs. 

“ Yes, and Pa must leave off all his vulgar habits,” 
interposed Miss Tuggs. 

“I’ll take care of all that,” responded Mr. Joseph 
Tuggs, complacently. He was, at that very moment, 
eating pickled salmon with a pocket-knife. 

“We must leave town immediately,” said Mr. Cymon 
Tuggs. 

Everybody concurred that this was an indispensable 
preliminary to being genteel. The question then arose. 
Where should they go ? 


THE TUGGS’S AT RAMSGATE. 117 

“Gravesend?” mildly suggested Mr. Joseph Tuggs. 
The idea was unanimously scouted. Gravesend was 
low, 

“ Margate ? ” insinuated Mrs. Tuggs. Worse and 
worse — nobody there, but tradespeople. 

“ Brighton ? ” Mr. Cymon Tuggs opposed an insur- 
mountable objection. All the coaches had been upset, 
in turn, within the last three weeks ; each coach had 
averaged two passengers killed, and six wounded ; and, 
in every case, the newspapers had distinctly understood 
that “ no blame whatever was attributable to the coach- 
man.” 

“ Ramsgate ? ” ejaculated Mr. Cymon, thoughtfully. 
To be sure : how stupid they must have been, not to 
have thought of that before ! Ramsgate was just the 
place of all others. 

Two months after this conversation, the City of Lon- 
don Ramsgate steamer was running gayly down the 
river. Her flag was flying, her band was playing, her 
passengers were conversing ; everything about her seemed 
gay and lively. — No wonder — the Tuggs’s were on 
board. 

“ Charming, a’n’t it ? ” said Mr. Joseph Tuggs, in a 
bottle-green great-coat, with a velvet collar of the same, 
and a blue travelling-cap with a gold band. 

“ Soul-inspiring,” replied Mr. Cymon Tuggs — he was 
entered at the bar. “ Soul-inspiring ! ” 

“ Delightful morning, sir ! ” said a stoutish, military- 
looking gentleman in a blue surtout buttoned up to his 
chin, and white trousers chained down to the soles of his 
boots. 

Mr. Cymon Tuggs took upon himself the responsi- 
bility of answering the observation. “ Heavenly ! ” he 
replied. 


118 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


“ You are an enthusiastic admirer of the beauties of 
Nature, sir ? ” said the military gentleman. 

“ I am, sir,” replied Mr. Cymon Tuggs. 

“ Travelled much, sir ? ” inquired the military gentle- 
man. 

“ Not much,” replied Mr. Cymon Tuggs. 

“ You’ve been on the continent, of course ? ” inquired 
the military gentleman. 

Not exactly,” replied Mr. Cymon Tuggs — in a quali- 
fied tone, as if he wished it to be implied that he had 
gone half-way and come back again. 

“ You of course intend your son to make the grand 
tour, sir ? ” said the military gentleman, addressing Mr. 
Joseph Tuggs. 

As Mr. Joseph Tuggs did not precisely understand 
what the grand tour was, or how such an article was 
manufactured, he replied, “ Of course.” Just as he said 
the word, there came tripping up, from her seat at the 
stern of the vessel, a young lady in a puce-colored silk 
cloak, and boots of the same ; with long black ringlets, 
large black eyes, brief petticoats, and unexceptionable 
ankles. 

“ Walter, my dear,” said the young lady to the military 
gentleman. 

“ Yes, Belinda, my love,” responded the military gen- 
tleman to the black-eyed young lady. 

“ What have you left me alone so long for ? ” said the 
young lady. “ I have been stared out of countenance by 
those rude young men.” 

“ What ! stared at ? ” exclaimed the military gentle- 
man, with an emphasis which made Mr. Cymon Tuggs 
withdraw his eyes from the young lady’s face with incon- 
ceivable rapidity. “ Which young men — where ? ” and 


IHE TUGGS’S AT RAMSGATE. 


119 


the military gentleman clenched his fist, and glared fear- 
fully on the cigar-smokers around. 

“ Be calm, Walter, I entreat,” said the young lady. 

“ I won’t,” said the military gentleman. 

“ Do, sir,” interposed Mr. Cymon Tuggs. “ They a’n’t 
worth your notice.” 

“ No — no — they are not, indeed,” urged the young 
lady. 

“ I will be calm,” said the military gentleman. “ You 
speak truly, sir. I thank you for a timely remonstrance, 
which may have spared me the guilt of manslaughter.” 
Calming his wmth, the military gentleman wrung Mr. 
Cymon Tuggs by the hand. 

“ My sister, sir ! ” said Mr. Cymon Tuggs ; seeing that 
the military gentleman was casting an admiring look 
towards Miss Charlotta. 

“ My wife, ma’am — Mrs. Captain Waters,” said the 
military gentleman, presenting the black-eyed young 
lady. 

“ My mother, ma’am — Mrs. Tuggs,” said Mr. Cymon. 
The military gentleman and his wife murmured enchant- 
ing courtesies : and the Tuggs’s looked as unembarrassed 
as they could. 

“ Walter, my dear,” said the black-eyed young lady, 
after they had sat chatting with the Tuggs’s some half 
hour. 

Yes, my love,” said the military gentleman. 

“ Don’t you think this gentleman (with an inclination 
of the head towards Mr. Cymon Tuggs) is very much 
like the Marquis Carriwini ? ” 

“ Lord bless me, very ! ” said the military gentleman. 

“ It struck me, the moment I saw him,” said the young 
lady, gazing intently, and with a melancholy air, on the 


120 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


Bcarlet countenance of Mr. Cymon Tuggs. Mr. Cymon 
Tuggg looked at everybody ; and finding that everybody 
was looking at him, appeared to feel some temporary 
difficulty in disposing of his eyesight. 

“ So exactly the air of the marquis,” said the military 
gentleman. 

“ Quite extraordinary ! ” sighed the military gentle- 
man’s lady. 

“ You don’t know the marquis, sir ? ” inquired the mili- 
tary gentleman. 

Mr. Cymon Tuggs stammered a negative. 

“ If you did,” continued Captain Walter Waters, “you 
would feel how much reason you have to be proud of the 
resemblance — a most elegant man, with a most prepos- 
sessing appearance.” 

“ He is — he is indeed ! ” exclaimed Belinda Waters 
energetically. As her eye caught that of Mr. Cymon 
Tuggs, she withdrew it from his features in bashful con- 
fusion. 

All this was highly gratifying to the feelings of the 
Tuggs’s ; and when, in the course of farther conversa- 
tion, it was discovered that Miss Charlotta Tuggs was the 
facsimile of a titled relative of Mrs. Belinda Waters, 
and that Mrs. Tuggs herself was the very picture of the 
Dowager Duchess of Dobbleton, their delight in the 
acquisition of so genteel and friendly an acquaintance 
knew no bounds. Even the dignity of Captain Walter 
Watei’S relaxed, to that degree, that he suffered himself 
to be prevailed upon by Mr. Joseph Tuggs to partake 
of cold pigeon-pie and sherry, on deck ; and a most de- 
lightful conversation, aided by these agreeable stimu- 
lants, was prolonged, until they ran alongside Ramsgate 
Pier. 


THE TUGGS’S AT RAMSGATE. 


121 


" Good by’e, dear ! ” said Mrs. Captain Waters to Miss 
Charlotta Tuggs, just before the bustle of landing com- 
menced ; we shall see you on the sands in the morning ; 
and, as we are sure to have found lodgings before then, 
I hope we shall be inseparables for many weeks to 
come.” 

“ Oh ! I hope so,” said Miss Charlotta Tuggs, em- 
phatically. 

“ Tickets, ladies and gen’lm’n,” said the man on the 
paddle-box. 

“ Want a porter, sir ? ” inquired a dozen men in smock- 
frocks. 

“ Now, my dear ! ” said Captain Waters. 

Good by’e ! ” said Mrs. Captain Waters — “ good 
by’e, Mr. Cymon!” and with a pressure of the hand 
which threw the amiable young man’s nerves into a state 
of considerable derangement, Mrs. Captain Waters dis- 
appeared among the crowd. A pair of puce-colored 
boots were seen ascending the steps, a white handker- 
chief fluttered, a black eye gleamed. The Waters’s 
were gone, and Mr. Cymon Tuggs was alone in a heart- 
less world. 

Silently and abstractedly did that too sensitive youth 
follow his revered parents, and a train of smock-frocks 
and wheel-barrows, along the pier, until the bustle of the 
scene around, recalled him to himself. The sun Ttas 
shining brightly ; the sea, dancing to its own music, 
rolled merrily in ; crowds of people promenaded to and 
fro ; young ladies tittered ; old ladies talked ; nurse- 
maids displayed their charms to the greatest possible 
advantage ; and their little charges ran up and down, 
and to and fro, and in and out, under the feet., and be- 
tween the legs, of the assembled concourse, in the most 


122 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


playful and exhilarating manner. There were old gen- 
tlemen, trying to make out objects through long tele- 
scopes ; and young ones, making objects of themselves in 
open shirt-collars ; ladies, carrying about portable chairs, 
and portable chairs carrying about invalids ; parties, 
waiting on the pier for parties who had come by the 
steamboat ; and nothing was to be heard but talking, 
laughing, welcoming, and merriment. 

“ Fly, sir ? ” exclaimed a chorus of fourteen men and 
six boys, the moment Mr. Joseph Tuggs, at the head of 
his little party, set foot in the street. 

“ Here’s the gen’lm’n at last ! ” said one, touching his 
hat with mock politeness. “ Werry glad to see you, sir, 
— been a-waitin’ for you these six weeks. Jump in, if 
you please, sir ! ” 

“ Nice light fly and a fast trotter, sir,” said another : 
“ fourteen mile a hour, and surroundin’ objects rendered 
inwisible by ex-treme welocity ! ” 

“ Large fly for your luggage, sir,” cried a third. 
“ Werry large fly here, sir — reg’lar bluebottle ! ” 

“ Here’s your fly, sir ! ” shouted another aspiring char- 
ioteer, mounting the box, and inducing an old gray horse 
to indulge in some perfect reminiscences of a canter. 
“ Look at him, sir ! — temper of a lamb and haction of a 
steam-ingeiii ! ” 

Resisting even the temptation of securing the services 
of so valuable a quadruped as the last-named, Mr. Joseph 
Tuggs beckoned to the proprietor of a dingy conveyance 
of a greenish hue, lined with faded striped calico ; and, 
I he luggage and the family having been deposited therein, 
the animal in the shafts, after describing circles in the 
road for a quarter of an hour, at last consented to 
depart in quest of lodgings. 


THE TUGGS’S AT RAMSGATE. 


123 


“ How many beds have you got ? ” screamed Mrs, 
Tuggs out of the fly, to the woman who opened the door 
of the first house which displayed a bill intimating that 
apartments were to be let within. 

“ How many did you want, ma’am ? ” was, of coui'se, 
the reply. 

“ Three.” 

“ Will you step in, ma’am ? ” Down got Mrs. Tuggs. 
The family were delighted. Splendid view of the sea 
from the front windows — charming ! A short pause. 
Back came Mrs. Tuggs again. — One parlor and a mat- 
tress. 

“ Why the devil didn’t they say so at first ? ” inquired 
Mr. Joseph Tuggs, rather pettishly. 

“ Don’t know,” said Mrs. Tuggs. 

“ Wretches ! ” exclaimed the nervous Cymon. An- 
other bill — another stoppage. Same question — same 
answer — similar result. 

“ What do they mean by this ? ” inquired Mr. Joseph 
Tuggs, thoroughly out of temper. 

“ Don’t know,” said the placid Mrs. Tuggs. 

“ Orvis the vay here, sir,” said the driver, by way of 
accounting for the circumstance in a satisfactory manner ; 
and off they went again, to make fresh inquiries, and 
encounter fresh disappointments. 

It had grown dusk when the “ fly ” — the rate of 
whose progress greatly belied its name — after climbing 
up four or five perpendicular hills, stopped before the 
door of a dusty house, with a bay-window, from which 
you could obtain a beautiful glimpse of the sea — if you 
thrust half your body out of it, at the imminent peril of 
falling into the area. Mrs. Tuggs alighted. One ground- 
floor sitting-room, and three cells with beds in them up- 


124 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


«itairs. A double bouse. Family on the opposite side. 
Five children milk-and-watering in the parlor, and one 
little boy, expelled for bad behavior, screaming on his 
back in the passage. 

“ What’s the terms ? ” said Mrs. Tuggs. The mistress 
of the house was considering the expediency of putting 
on an extra guinea ; so, she coughed slightly, and affected 
not to hear the question. 

“ What’s the terms ? ” said Mrs. Tuggs, in a louder 
key. 

“ Five guineas a week, ma’am, with attendance,” re- 
plied the lodging-house keeper. (Attendance means the 
privilege of ringing the bell as often as you like, for your 
own amusement.) 

“ Rather dear,” said Mrs. Tuggs. 

“ Oh dear, no, ma’am ! ” replied the mistress of the 
house, with a benign smile of pity at the ignorance of 
manners and customs, which the observation betrayed. 
“ Very cheap ! ” 

Such an authority was indisputable. Mrs. Tuggs paid 
a week’s rent in advance, and took the lodgings for a 
month. In an hour’s time, the family were seated at tea 
in their new abode. 

“ Capital srimps ! ” said Mr. Joseph Tuggs. 

ISIr. Cymon eyed his father with a rebellious scowl, as 
lie emphatically said ‘‘ Shrimps.^' 

“ Well then, shrimps,” said Mr. Joseph Tuggs. “ Srimps 
(!!• shrimps, don’t much matter.” 

Tliere was pity, blended with malignity, in Mr. Cy- 
mon’s eye, as he replied, “ Don’t matter, father ! What 
would Captain Waters say, if he heard such vulgar- 
ity?” 

“ Or what would dear Mrs. Captain Waters say,” added 


THE TUGGS’S AT RAMSGATE. 


125 


Charlotta, if she saw mother — ma, I mean — eating 
them whole, heads and all ! ” 

“ It won’t bear thinking of ! ” ejaculated Mr. Cymon, 
with a shudder. “ How different,” he thought, “ from the 
Dowager Duchess of Dobbleton ! ” 

“ Very pretty woman, Mrs. Captain Waters, is she not, 
Cymon ? ” inquired Miss Charlotta. 

A glow of nervous excitement passed over the coun- 
tenance of Mr. Cymon Tuggs, as he replied, “ An angel 
of beauty ! ” 

“ Hallo ! ” said Mr. Joseph Tuggs, “ Hallo, Cymon, 
my boy, take care. Married lady you know ; ” and he 
winked one of his twinkling eyes knowingly. 

“ Why,” exclaimed Cymon, starting up with an ebulli- 
tion of fury, as unexpected as alarming, “ Why am I to 
be reminded of that blight of my happiness, and ruin of 
my hopes ? Why am I to be taunted with the miseries 
which are heaped upon my head ? Is it not enough to 
— to — to,” and the orator paused ; but whether for 
want of words, or lack of breath, was never distinctly 
ascertained. 

There was an impressive solemnity in the tone of this 
address, and in the air with which the romantic Cymon, 
at its conclusion, rang the bell, and demanded a flat can- 
dlestick, which effectually forbade a reply. He stalked 
dramatically to bed, and the Tuggs’s went to bed too, 
half an hour afterw^ards, in a state of considerable mys- 
tification and perplexity. 

If the pier had presented a scene of life and bustle lu 
the Tuggs’s on their first landing at Ramsgate, it was far 
surpassed by the appearance of the sands on the morning 
after their arrival. It was a fine, bright, clear day, with 
\ light breeze from the sea. There were the same ladies 


126 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


and gentlemen, the same children, the same nursemaids, 
the same telescopes, the same portable chairs. The 
ladies were employed in needlework, or watchguard 
making, or knitting, or reading novels ; the gentlemen 
were reading newspapers and magazines ; the children 
were digging holes in the sand with wooden spades, and 
collecting water therein ; the nursemaids, with their 
youngest charges in their arms, were running in after 
the waves, and then running back with the waves after 
them ; and, now and then, a little sailing-boat either de- 
parted with a gay and talkative cargo of passengers, or 
returned with a very silent, and particularly uncomfort- 
able-looking one. 

“ Well, I never ! ” exclaimed Mrs. Tuggs, as she and 
Mr. Joseph Tuggs, and Miss Charlotta Tuggs, and Mr. 
Cymon Tuggs, with their eight feet in a corresponding 
number of yellow shoes, seated themselves on four rush- 
bottomed chairs, which, being placed in a soft part of the 
sand, forthwith sunk down some two feet and a half. — ■ 
« Well, I never ! ” 

Mr. Cymon, by an exertion of great personal strength, 
uprooted the chairs, and removed them further back. 

“Why, I’m bless’d if there a’n’t some ladies agoing 
in ! ” exclaimed Mr. Joseph Tuggs, with intense aston- 
ishment. 

“ Lor, pa ! ” exclaimed Miss Charlotta. 

“ There w, my dear,” said Mr. Joseph Tuggs. And, 
sure enough, four young ladies, each furnished with a 
towel, tripped up the steps of a bathing-machine. In 
went the horse, floundering about in the water ; round 
Jumed the machine ; down sat the driver ; and presently 
out burst the young ladies aforesaid, with four distinct 
splashes. 


THE TUGGS’S AT RAMSGATE. 


1-27 


“ Well, that’s sing’ler, too ! ” ejaculated Mr. Joseph 
Tuggs, after an awkward pause. Mr. Cymon coughed 
slightly. 

“ Why, here’s some gentlemen agoing in on this side,” 
exclaimed Mi's. Tuggs, in a tone of horror. 

Three machines — three horses — three flounderings 
— three turnings round — three splashes — three gen- 
tlemen, disporting themselves in the water like so many 
dolphins. 

“ Well, tha^s sing’ler ! ” said Mr. Joseph Tuggs again. 
Miss Charlotta coughed this time, and another pause 
ensued. It was agreeably broken. 

“ How d’ye do, dear ? We have been looking for you, 
all the morning,” said a voice to Miss Charlotta Tuggs. 
Mrs. Captain Waters was the owner of it. 

“ How d’ ye do ? ” said Captain Walter Waters, all 
suavity; and a most cordial interchange of greetings 
ensued. 

“ Belinda, my love,” said Captain Walter Waters, ap- 
plying his glass to his eye, and looking in the direction 
of the sea. 

“ Yes, my dear,” replied Mrs. Captain Waters. 

“ There’s Harry Thompson ! ” 

“ Where ? ” said Belinda, applying her glass to her 
-ye. 

“ Bathing.” 

“ Lor, so it is ! He don’t see us, does he ? ” 

“ No, I don’t think he does,” replied the captain. 

Bless my soul, how very singular!” 

“ What ? ” inquired Belinda. 

“ There’s Mary Golding, too.” 

“ Lor I — where ? ” (Up went the glass again.) 

“ There ! ” said the captain, pointing to one of tlie 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


i2e 

joung ladies before noticed, who, in her bathing costume, 
looked as if she was enveloped in a patent Mackintosh, 
of scanty dimensions. 

“ So it is, I declare ! ” exclaimed Mrs. Captain Waters. 
“ How very curious we should see them both ! ” 

Very,” said the captain, with perfect coolness. 

“ It’s the reg’lar thing here, you see,” whispered Mr. 
Cymon Tuggs to his father. 

“ I see it is,” whispered Mr. Joseph Tuggs in reply. 
“ Queer though — a’n’t it ? ” Mr. Cymon Tuggs nodded 
assent. 

“ What do you think of doing with yourself this 
morning ? ” inquired the captain. “ Shall we lunch at 
Pegwell ? ” 

“ I should like that very much indeed,”' interposed 
Mrs. Tuggs. She had never heard of Pegwell ; but the 
word “ lunch ” had reached her ears, and it sounded very 
agreeably. 

“ How shall we go ? ” inquired the captain ; “ it’s too 
warm to walk.” 

“A shay?” suggested Mr. Joseph Tuggs. 

“ Chaise,” whispered Mr. Cymon. 

“ I should think one would be enough,” said Mr. Joseph 
Tuggs aloud, quite unconscious of the meaning of the 
correction. “ However, two shays if you like.” 

“ I should like a donkey so much,” said Belinda. 

“ Oh, so should I ! ” echoed Charlotta Tuggs. 

“ Well, we can have a fly,” suggested the captain, 
“ and you can have a couple of donkeys.” 

A fresh difficulty arose. Mi's. Captain Waters de- 
clared it would be decidedly improper for two ladies to 
ride alone. The remedy was obvious. Perhaps young 
Mr. Tuggs would be gallant enough to accompany them. 


THE TUGGS’S AT RAMSGATE. 


129 


Mr. Cymon Tuggs blushed, smiled, looked vacant, and 
faintly protested that he was no horseman. The objec- 
tion was at once overruled. A fly was speedily found ; 
and three donkeys — which the proprietor declared on 
his solemn asseveration to be “ three parts blood, and the 
other corn ” — were engaged in the service. 

“ Kim up ! ’* shouted one of the two boys who followed 
behind, to propel the donkeys, when Belinda Watera and 
Charlotta Tuggs had been hoisted, and pushed, and pulled, 
into their respective saddles. 

“ Hi — hi — hi ! ” groaned the other boy behind Mr. 
Cymon Tuggs. Away went the donkey, with the stir- 
rups jingling against the heels of Cymon’s boots, and 
Cymon’s boots nearly scraping the ground. 

“ Way — way ! Wo — o — o — o — ! ” cried Mr. Cymon 
Tuggs as well as he could, in the midst of the jolting. 

“ Don’t make it gallop ! ” screamed Mrs. Captain 
Waters, behind. 

“ My donkey will go into the public-house ! ” shrieked 
Miss Tuggs in the rear. 

‘‘Hi — hi — hi!” groaned both the boys together; 
and on went the donkeys as if nothing would ever stop 
them. 

Everything has an end, however ; even the galloping 
of donkeys will cease in time. The animal which Mr. 
Cymon Tuggs bestrode, feeling sundry uncomfortable 
tugs at the bit, the intent of which he could by no means 
divine, abruptly sidled against a brick wall, and expressed 
his uneasiness by grinding Mr. Cymon Tuggs ’s leg on the 
rough surface. Mrs. Captain Waters’s donkey, appar- 
ently under the influence of some playfulness of spirit, 
rushed suddenly, head first, into a hedge, and declined 
"o come out again : and the quadruped on which Miss 
9 


VOL. II. 


180 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


Tuggs was mounted, expressed his delight at this humor- 
ous proceeding by firmly planting his fore-feet against 
the ground, and kicking up his hind-legs in a very agile, 
but somewhat alarmi.jg manner. 

This abrupt termination to the rapidity of the ride, 
naturally occasioned some confusion. Both the ladies 
indulged in vehement screaming for several minutes ; 
and Mr. Cymon Tuggs, besides sustaining intense bodily 
pain, had the additional mental anguish of witnessing 
their distressing situation, without having the power to 
rescue them, by reason of his leg being firmly screwed 
in between the animal and the wall. The efforts of the 
boys, however, assisted by the ingenious expedient of 
twisting the tail of the most rebellious donkey, restored 
order in a much shorter time than could have reasonably 
been expected, and the little party jogged slowly on 
together. 

“ Now let ’em walk,” said Mr. Cymon Tuggs. “ It’s 
cruel to overdrive ’em.” 

“ Werry well, sir,” replied the boy, with a grin at his 
companion, as if he understood Mr. Cymon to mean that 
the cruelty applied less to the animals than to their 
riders. 

“ What a lovely day, dear ! ” said Charlotta. 

“ Charming ; enchanting, dear ! ” responded Mrs. 
Captain Waters. “ What a beautiful prospect, Mr. 
Tuggs ! ” 

Cymon looked full in Belinda’s face, as he responded 
— “ Beautiful, indeed ! ” The lady cast down her eyes, 
and suffered the animal she was riding to fall a little 
Dack. Cymon Tuggs instinctively did the same. 

There was a brief silence, broken only by a sigh from 
Mr. Cymon Tuggs. 


THE TEGGS’S AT RAMSGATE. 


131 


“ Mr. Cymon,” said the lady suddenly, in a low tone, 
“ Mr. Cymon — I am another’s.” 

IVIr. Cymon expressed his perfect concurrence in a 
statement which it was impossible to controvert. 

“ If I had not been — ” resumed Belinda ; and there 
she stopped. 

“ What — what ? ” said Mr. Cymon, earnestly. “ Do 
not torture me. What would you say ? ” 

“ If I had not been ” — continued Mrs. Captain Waters 
— “ if, in earlier life, it had been my fate to have known, 
and been beloved by, a noble youth — a kindred soul — 
a congenial spirit — one capable of feeling and appre- 
ciating the sentiments which — ” 

“ Heavens ! what do I hear ? ” exclaimed Mr. Cymon 
Tuggs. “ Is it possible ! can I believe my — Come up ! ” 
(This last unsentimental parenthesis was addressed to the 
donkey, who with his head between his fore-legs, ap- 
peared to be examining the state of his shoes with great 
anxiety.) 

“ Hi — hi — hi,” said the boys behind. “ Come up,” 
expostulated Cymon Tuggs again. “ Hi — hi — hi ! ” 
repeated the boys again. And whether it was that the 
animal felt indignant at the tone of Mr. Tuggs’s com- 
mand, or felt alarmed by the noise of the deputy pro- 
prietor’s boots running behind him ; or whether he burned 
with a noble emulation to outstrip the other donkeys ; 
certain it is that he no sooner heard the second series of 
‘ hi — hi’s,” than he started away, with a celerity of pace 
which jerked Mr. Cymon’s hat off, instantaneously, and 
carried him to the Pegwell Bay hotel in no time, where 
he deposited his rider without giving him the trouble of 
dismounting, by sagaciously pitching him over his head 
into the very doorway of the tavern. 


132 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


Great was the confusion of Mr. Cymon Tuggs, when 
he was put right end uppermost by two waiters ; consid- 
erable was the alarm of Mrs. Tuggs in behalf of her 
Bon ; agonizing were the apprehensions of Mrs. Captain 
Waters on his account. It was speedily discovered, 
however, that he .had not sustained much more injury 
than the donkey — he was grazed, and the animal was 
grazing — and then it was a delightful party to be sure ! 
Mr. and Mrs. Tuggs, and the captain, had ordered lunch 
in the little garden behind : — small saucers of large 
shrimps, dabs of butter, crusty loaves, and bottled ale. 
The sky was without a cloud ; there were flower-pots 
and turf before them ; the sea, from the foot of the cliff, 
stretching away as far as the eye could discern anything 
at all ; vessels in the distance, with sails as white and 
as small as nicely got-up cambric handkerchiefs. The 
shrimps were delightful,* the ale better, and the captain 
even more pleasant than either. Mrs. Captain Waters 
was in such spirits after lunch ! — chasing, first the cap- 
tain across the turf, and among the flower-pots ; and 
then JVIr. Cymon Tuggs ; and then Miss Tuggs ; and 
laughing, too, quite boisterously. But as the captain 
said, it didn’t matter ; who knew what they were, there ? 
For all the people of the house knew, they might be 
common people. To which Mr. Joseph Tuggs responded, 
“ To be sure.” And then they went down the steep 
wooden steps a little further on, which led to the bottom 
of the cliff ; and looked at the crabs, and the seaweed, 
and the eels, till it was more than fully time to go back 
to Ramsgate again. Finally, Mr. Cymon Tuggs as- 
cended the steps last, and Mrs. Captain Waters last but 
me , and Mr. Cymon Tuggs discovered that the foot 


THE TUGGS’S AT RAMSGATE. 


133 


and ankle of Mrs. Captain Waters were even more un- 
exceptionable than he had at first supposed. 

Taking a donkey towards his ordinary place of resi- 
dence, is a very different thing, and a feat much more easily 
to be accomplished, than taking him from it. It requires 
a great deal of foresight and presence of mind in the 
one case, to anticipate the numerous flights of his discur- 
sive imagination ; whereas, in the other, all you have to 
do, is, to hold on, and place a blind confidence in the 
animal. Mr. Cymon Tuggs adopted the latter expedient 
on his return ; and his nerves were so little discomposed 
by the journey, that he distinctly understood they were 
all to meet again at the library in the evening. 

The library was crowded. There were the same 
ladies, and the same gentlemen, who had been on the 
sands in the morning, and on the pier the day before. 
There were young ladies, in maroon-colored gowns and 
black velvet bracelets, dispensing fancy articles in the 
shop, and presiding over games of chance in the concert- 
room. There were marriageable daughters, and mar- 
riage-making mammas, gaming and promenading, and 
turning over music, and flirting. There were some male 
beaux doing the sentimental in whispers, and others 
doing the ferocious in moustache. There were Mrs. Tuggs 
in amber. Miss Tuggs in sky-blue, Mrs. Captain Waters in 
pink. There was Captain Waters in a braided surtout ; 
there was Mr. Cymon Tuggs in pumps and a gilt waist- 
coat ; there was Mr. Joseph Tuggs in a blue coat, and a 
shirt-frill. 

“ Numbers three, eight, and eleven ! ” cried one of the 
young ladies in the maroon-colored gowns. 

‘‘ Numbers three, eight, and eleven ! ” echoed another 
young lady in the same uniform. 


184 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


“ Number three’s gone,” said the first young lady, 
“Numbers eight and eleven ! ” 

“ Numbers eight and eleven ! ” echoed the second 
young lady. 

“ Number eight’s gone, Mary Ann,” said the first 
young lady. 

“ Number eleven ! ” screamed the second. 

“ The numbers are all taken now, ladies, if you please,” 
said the first. The representatives of numbears three, 
eight, and eleven, and the rest of the numbers, crowded 
round the table. 

“ Will you throw, ma’am ? ” said the presiding- goddess, 
handing the dice-box to the eldest daughter of a stout 
lady, with four girls. 

There was a profound silence among the lookers-on. 

“ Throw, Jane, my dear,” said the stout lady. An in- 
teresting display of bashfulness — a little blushing in a 
cambric handkerchief — a whispering to a younger sister. 

“Amelia, my dear, throw for your sister,” said tne 
stout lady ; and then she turned to a walking advertise- 
ment of Rowland’s Macassar Oil, who stood next her, 
and said, “ Jane is so very modest and retiring ; but I 
can’t be angry with her for it. An artless and unsophis- 
ticated girl is so truly amiable, that I often ^\dsh Amelia 
was more like her sister ! ” 

The gentleman with the whiskers whispered his ad- 
miring approval. 

“ Now, my dear ! ” said the stout lady. Miss Amelia 
threw — eight for her sister, ten for herself. 

“ Nice figure, Amelia,” whispered the stout lady, to a 
thin youth beside her. 

“ Beautiful ! ” 

“ And such a spirit ! I am like you in that respect. T 


THE TUGGS’S AT RAMSGATE. 


135 


can not help admiring that life and vivacity. Ah ! (a 
sigh) I wish I could make poor Jane a little more like 
my dear Amelia ! ” 

The young gentleman cordially acquiesced in the sen- 
timent ; both he, and the individual first addressed, were 
perfectly contented. 

“ Who’s this ? ” inquired Mr. Cymon Tuggs of Mrs. 
Captain Waters, as a short female, in a blue velvet hat 
and feathers, was led into the orchestra, by a fat man in 
black tights, and cloudy Berlins. 

“ Mrs. Tippin, of the London theatres,” replied Be- 
linda, referring to the programme of the concert. 

The talented Tippin having condescendingly acknowl- 
edged the clapping of hands, and shouts of “ bravo ! ” 
which greeted her appearance, proceeded to sing the 
popular cavatina of “ Bid me discourse,” accompanied on 
the piano by Mr. Tippin ; after which, Mr. Tippin sang 
a comic song, accompanied on the piano by Mrs. Tippin : 
the applause consequent upon, which was only to be ex- 
ceeded by the enthusiastic approbation bestowed upon an 
air with variations on the guitar, by Miss Tippin, accom- 
panied on the chin by Master Tippin. 

Thus passed the evening ; thus passed the days and 
evenings of the Tuggs’s, and the Waters’s, for six weeks. 
Sands in the morning — donkeys at noon — - pier in the 
afternoon — library at night — and the same people 
everywhere. * . 

On that very night six weeks, the moon w'as shining 
brightly over the calm sea, wliich dashed against the feet 
of the tall gaunt cliffs, with just enough noise to lull the 
old fish to sleep, without disturbing the young ones, when 
two figures were discernible — or would have been, if 
anybody had looked for them — seated on one of the 


136 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


wooden benches which are stationed near the verge of 
the western cliff. The moon had climbed higher into 
the heavens, by two hours’ journeying, since those figures 
first sat down — and yet they had moved not. The 
crowd of loungers had thinned and dispersed ; the noise 
of itinerant musicians had died away ; light after light 
had appeared in the windows of the different houses in 
the distance ; blockade-man after blockade-man had 
passed the spot, wending his way towards his solitary 
post ; and yet those figures had remained stationary. 
Some portions of the two forms were in deep shadow, 
but the light of the moon fell strongly on a puce-colored 
boot and a glazed stock. Mr. Cymon Tuggs, and IVIrs. 
Captain Waters, were seated on that bench. They spoke 
not, but were silently gazing on the sea. 

“Walter will return to-morrow,” said IMrs. Captain 
Waters, mournfully breaking silence. 

Mr. Cymon Tuggs sighed like a gust of wind through 
a forest of gooseberry bushes, as he replied, “ Alas he 
will.” 

“ Oh, Cymon ! ” resumed Belinda, “ the chaste delight, 
the calm happiness, of this one week of Platonic love, is 
too much for me ! ” 

Cymon was about' to suggest that it was too little for 
him, but he stopped himself, and murmured unintel- 
ligibly. 

“ And to think that even this glimpse of happiness, 
innocent as it is,” exclaimed Belinda, “ is now to be lost 
for ever ! ” 

“ Oh, do not say for ever, Belinda,” exclaimed the ex- 
citable Cymon, as two strongly defined tears chased each 
other down his pale face — it was so long that there was 
plenty of room for a chase — “ Do not say for ever ! ” 


THE TUGGS’S AT RAMSGATE. 


J87 


“ I must,” replied Belinda. 

“ Why ? ” urged Cymon, “ oh why ? Such Platonic 
acquaintance as ours is so harmless, that even your hus- 
band can never object to it.” 

“ My husband I ” exclaimed Belinda. “ You little 
know him. Jealous and revengeful ; ferocious in his 
revenge — a maniac in his jealousy! Would you be 
assassinated before my eyes ? ” Mr. Cymon Tuggs, in a 
voice broken by emotion, expressed his disinclination to 
undergo the process of assassination before the eyes of 
anybody. 

“ Then leave me,” said Mrs. Captain Waters. “ Leave 
me, this night, for ever. It is late ; let us return.” 

Mr. Cymon Tuggs sadly offered the lady his arm, and 
escorted her to her lodgings. He paused at the door — 
he felt a Platonic pressure of his hand. “ Good night,” 
he said, hesitating. 

“ Good night,” sobbed the lady. Mr. Cymon Tuggs 
paused again. 

“ Won’t you walk in, sir ? ” said the servant. Mr. 
Tuggs hesitated. Oh, that hesitation I He did walk 
in. 

“ Good night ! ” said Mr. Cymon Tuggs again, when he 
reached the drawing-room. 

“ Good night I ” replied Belinda ; “ and, if at any 
period of my life, I — Hush!” The lady paused and 
stared, with a steady gaze of horror, on the ashy coun- 
tenance of Mr. Cymon Tuggs. There was a double 
knock at the street-door. 

“ It is my husband ! ” said Belinda, as the captain’s 
voice was heard below. 

“ And my family ! ” added Cymon Tuggs, as the voices 
of his relatives floated up the staircase. 


138 


SKETCHES BY BOZ 


“ The curtain ! The curtain ! ” gasped Mrs. Captain 
Waters, pointing to the window, before which some 
chintz hangings were closely drawn. 

“ But I have done nothing wrong,” said the hesitating 
Cymon. 

“ The curtain ! ” reiterated the frantic lady : “ you 
will be murdered.” This last appeal to his feelings 
was iiTesistible. The dismayed Cymon concealed 
himself behind the curtain, with pantomimic sudden- 
ness. 

Enter the captain, Joseph Tuggs, IVIrs. Tuggs, and 
Charlotta. 

“ My dear,” said the captain, “ Lieutenant Slaughter.” 
Two iron-shod boots and one gruff voice were heard by 
Mr. Cymon to advance, and acknowledge the honor of 
the introduction. ' The sabre of the lieutenant rattled 
heavily upon the floor, as he seated himself at the table. 
Mr. Cymon’s fears almost overcame his reason. 

“ The brandy, my dear ! ” said the captain. Here was 
a situation ! They were going to make a night of it ! 
And Mr. Cymon Tuggs was pent up behind the curtain 
and afraid to breathe ! 

“ Slaughter,” said the captain, “ a cigar ? ” 

Now, Mr. Cymon Tuggs never could smoke, 'without 
feeling it indispensably necessary to retire, immediately, 
and never could smell smoke without a strong disposition 
to cough. The cigars were introduced ; the captain was 
a professed smoker ; so was the lieutenant ; so was Joseph 
Tuggs. The apartment was small, the door was closed, 
the smoke powerful ; it hung in heavy wreaths over the 
room, and at length found its way behind the curtain. 
Cymon Tuggs held his nose, his moutli, his breath. It 
was all of no use — out came the cough. 


THE TUGGS’S AT RAMSGATE. 139 

“ Bless my soul ! ” said the captain, “ I beg your par- 
don, Miss Tuggs. You dislike smoking?” 

“ Oh, no ; I don’t indeed,” said Charlotta. 

“ It makes you cough.” 

“ Oh dear no.” ' 

“ You coughed just now.” 

“ Me, Captain Waters ! Lor! how can you say so?” 

“ Somebody coughed,” said the captain. 

“ I certainly thought so,” said Slaughter. No ; eveiy- 
body denied it. 

“ Fancy,” said the captain. 

“ Must be,” echoed Slaughter. 

Cigars resumed — more smoke — another cough — 
smothered, but violent. 

“ Damned odd ! ” said the captain, staring about 
him. 

“ Sing’ler ! ” ejaculated the unconscious Mr. Joseph 
Tuggs. - ‘ 

Lieutenant Slaughter looked first at one person mys- 
teriously, then at another ; then, laid down his cigar ; 
then, approached the window on tiptoe, and pointed with 
his right thumb over his shoulder, in the direction of the 
curtain. 

Slaughter 1 ” ejaculated the captain, rising from table, 
“ what do you mean ? ” 

The lieutenant, in reply, drew back the curtain and 
discovered Mr. Cymon Tuggs behind it; pallid with 
apprehension, and blue with wanting to cough. 

“ Aha I ” exclaimed the captain furiously, “ What do 1 
jee ? Slaughter, your sabre 1 ” 

“ Cymon I ” screamed the Tuggs’s. 

“ Mercy I ” said Belinda. 

“ Platonic ! ” gasped Cymon. 


14U 


SKETCHES BY BOZ 


“ Your sabre ! ” roared the captain “ Slaughter — 
nnhand me — the villain’s life ! ” 

“ Murder ! ” screamed the Tuggs’s. 

“ Hold him fast, sir ! ” faintly articulated Cymon. 

“ Water ! ” exclaimed Joseph Tuggs — and Mr. Cymon 
Tuggs and all the ladies forthwith fainted away, and 
formed a tableau. 

Most willingly would we conceal the disastrous termi- 
nation of the six weeks’ acquaintance. A troublesome 
form, and an arbitrary custom, however, prescribe that a 
story should have a conclusion, in addition to a com- 
mencement ; we have therefore no alternative. Lieu- 
tenant Slaughter brought a message — the captain 
brought an action. Mr. Joseph Tuggs interposed — the 
lieutenant negotiated. When Mr. Cymon Tuggs re- 
covered from the nervous disorder into which misplaced 
affection, and exciting circumstances had plunged him, he 
found that his family had lost their pleasant acquaint- 
ance ; that his father was minus fifteen hundred pounds ; 
and the captain plus the precise sum. The money was 
paid to hush the matter up, but it got abroad notwith- 
standing ; and there are not wanting some who affirm 
that three designing impostors never found more easy 
dupes, than did Captain Waters, Mrs. Waters, and Lieu- 
tenant Slaughter, in the Tuggs’s at Ramsgate. 


HORATIO SPARKINS. 


141 


CHAPTER V. 

HORATIO SPARKINS. 

“ Indeed, my love, he paid Teresa very great atten- 
tion on the last assembly night,” said Mrs. Malderton, 
addressing her spouse, who, after the fatigues of the day 
in the City, was sitting with a silk handkerchief over his 
head, and his feet on the fender, drinking his port ; — 
“ very great attention ; and I say again, every possible 
encouragement ought to be given him. He positively 
must be asked down here to dine.” 

“ Who must ? ” inquired Mr. Malderton. 

“ Why, you know whom I mean, my dear — the young 
man with the black whiskers and the white cravat, who 
has just come out at our assembly, and whom all the 

girls are talking about. Young dear me ! what’s 

his name ? — Marianne, what is his name ? ” continued 
Mrs. Malderton, addressing her youngest daughter, who 
was engaged in netting a purse and looking sentimental. 

“ Mr. Horatio Sparkins, ma,” replied Miss Marianne, 
with a sigh. 

“ Oh ! yes, to be sure — Horatio Sparkins,” said Mrs 
Malderton. “ Decidedly the most gentleman-like young 
man I ever saw. I am sure, in the beautifully made 
3oat he wore the other night, he looked like — like — ” 

“ Like Prince Leopold, ma — so noble, so full of sen 
timent ! ” suggested Marianne, in a tone of enthusiastic 
admiration. 

‘‘ You should recollect, my dear,” resumed Mrs. Mai 


142 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


derton, “ that Teresa is now eight-and-twenty ; and that it 
really is very important that something should be done.’* 

Miss Teresa Malderton was a very little girl, rather 
fat, with vermilion cheeks, but good-humored, and still 
disengaged, although, to do her justice, the misfortune 
arose from no lack of perseverance on her part. In vain, 
had she flirted for ten years ; in vain, had Mr. and Mrs. 
Malderton assiduously kept up an extensive acquaintance 
among the young eligible bachelors of Camberwell, and 
even of Wandsworth and Brixton; to say nothing of 
those who “ dropped in ” from town. Miss Malderton 
was as well known as the lion on the top of Northumber- 
land House, and had an equiil chance of “ going oif.” 

“ I am quite sure you’d like him,” continued Mrs. 
Malderton ; “ he is so gentlemanly ! ” 

“ So clever ! ” said Miss Marianne. 

“ And has such a flow of language ! ” added Miss 
Teresa. 

“ He has a great respect for you, my dear,” said Mrs. 
Malderton to her husband. Mr. Malderton coughed, and 
looked at the fire. 

“ Yes, I’m sure he’s very much attached to pa’s so- 
ciety,” said Miss Marianne. 

“ No doubt of it,” echoed Miss Teresa. 

Indeed, he said as much to me in confidence,” ob- 
served Mrs. Malderton. 

“ Well, well,” returned Mr. Malderton, somewhat flat- 
tered ; “ If I see him at the assembly to-morrow, perhaps 
I’ll ask him down. I hope he knows we live at Oak 
Lodge, Camberwell, my dear?” 

“ Of course — and that you keep a one-horse carriage.” 

“ I’ll see about it,” said Mr. Malderton, composing 
himself for a nap; “I’ll see about it.” 


HORATIO SPARKINS. 


148 


Mr* Malderton was a man whose whole scope of ideas 
was limited to Lloyd’s, the Exchange, the India House, 
and the Bank. A few successful speculations had raised 
him from a situation of obscurity and comparative pov- 
erty to a state of affluence. As frequently happens in 
such cases, the ideas of himself and his family became 
elevated to an extraordinary pitch as their means in- 
creased ; they affected fashion, taste, and many other 
fooleries, in imitation of their betters, and had a very 
decided and becoming horror of anything which could, 
by possibility, be considered low. He was hospitable 
from ostentation, illiberal from ignorance, and prejudiced 
from conceit. Egotism and the love of display induced 
him to keep an excellent table : convenience, and a love 
of good things of this life, insured him plenty of guests. 
He liked to have clever men, or what he considered- such, 
at his table, because it was a great thing to talk about ; 
but he never could endure what he called “ sharp fel- 
lows.” Probably, he cherished this feeling out of com- 
pliment to liis two sons, who gave their respected parent 
no uneasiness in that particular. The family were am- 
bitious of forming acquaintances and connections in some 
sphere of society superior to that in which they them- 
selves moved ; and one of the necessary consequences of 
this desire, added to their utter ignorance of the world 
beyond their own small circle, was, that any one who 
could lay claim to an acquaintance with people of rank 
and title, had a sure passport to the table at Oak Lodge, 
Camberwell. 

The appearance of Mr. Horatio Sparkins at the as- 
sembly had excited no small degree of surprise and 
curiosity among its regular frequenters. Who could he 
oe ? He was evidently reserved, and apparently melon- 


144 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


choly. Was he a clergyman ? — He danced too well, 
A barrister ? — He said he was not called. He used 
very fine words, and talked a great deal. Could he be 
a distinguished foreigner, come to England for the pur- 
pose of describing the country ; its manners and cus- 
toms ; and frequenting public balls and public dinners, 
with the view of becoming acquainted with high life, 
polished etiquette and English refinement ? — No, he 
had not a foreign accent. Was he a surgeon, a contribu- 
tor to the magazines, a writer of fashionable novels, or 
an artist ? — No ; to each and all of these surmises, there 
existed some valid objection. — “ Then,” said everybody, 
“ he must be somebody'’ — “I should think he must be,” 
reasoned Mr. Malderton, with himself, “ because he per- 
ceives our superiority, and pays us so much attention.” 

The night succeeding the conversation we have just 
recorded, was “ assembly night.” The double-fly was 
ordered to be at the door of Oak Lodge at nine o’clock 
precisely. The Miss Maldertons were dressed in sky- 
blue satin trimmed with artificial flowers ; and Mi’s. M. 
(who was a little fat woman) in ditto ditto, looked like 
her eldest daughter multiplied by two. Mr. Frederick 
Malderton, the eldest son, in full-dress costume, was the 
very beau ideal of a smart waiter ; and Mr. Thomas Mal- 
derton, the youngest, with his white dress-stock, blue coat, 
bright buttons, and red watch-ribbon, strongly resembled 
the portrait of that interesting, but rash young gentle- 
man, George Barnwell. Every member of the party 
had made up his or her mind to cultivate the acquaint- 
ance of Mr. Horatio Sparkins. Miss Teresa, of course, 
was to be as amiable and interesting as ladies of eight- 
and-twenty on the look-out for a husband usually are. 
Mrs. Malderton would be all smiles and graces. Miss 


HORATIO SPARKINS. 


145 


Marianne would request the favor of some verses for her 
album. Mr. Malderton would patronize the great un- 
known by asking him to dinner. Tom intended to ascer- 
tain the extent of his information on the interesting 
topics of snuff and cigars. Even Mr. Frederick JMal- 
derton himself, the family authority on all points of taste, 
dress, and fashionable arrangement ; who had lodgings 
of his own in town ; who had a free admission to Co- 
vent Garden theatre ; who always dressed according to 
the fashions of the months ; who went up the water 
twice a-week in the season ; and who actually had an 
intimate friend who once knew a gentleman who for- 
merly lived in the Albany, — even he had determined 
that Mr. Horatio Sparkins must be a devilish good fellow, 
and that he would do him the honor of challenging him 
to a game at billiards. 

The first object that met the anxious eyes of the ex- 
pectant family on their entrance into the ball-room, was 
thq interesting Horatio, with his hair briished off his fore- 
head, and his eyes fixed on the ceiling, reclining in a 
contemplative attitude on one of the seats. 

“ There he is, my dear,” whispered Mrs. Malderton to 
Mr. Malderton. 

“ How like Lord Byron ! ” murmured Miss Teresa. 

“ Or Montgomery ! ” whispered Miss Marianne. 

Or the portraits of Captain Cook ! ” suggested Tom. 

“ Tom — don’t be an ass ! ” said his father, who checked 
him on all occasions, probably with a view to prevent his 
becoming “ sharp ” — which was very unnecessary. 

The elegant Sparkins attitudinized with admirable 
effect, until the family had crossed the room. He then 
started up, with the most natural appearance of surprise 
and delight ; accosted Mrs. Malderton with the utmost 

VOL. II. 10 


146 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


cordiality ; saluted the young ladies in the most enchant- 
ing manner ; bowed to, and shook hands wuth, Mr. Mal- 
derton, with a degree of respect amounting almost to 
veneration ; and returned the greetings of the two young 
men in a half-gratified, half-patronizing manner, which 
fully convinced them that he must be an important, and, 
at the same time, condescending personage. 

“ Miss Malderton,” said Horatio, after the ordinary 
salutations, and bowing very low, “ may I be permitted 
to presume to hope that you will allow me to have the 
pleasure — ” 

“ I don’t think I am engaged,” said Miss Teresa, with 
a dreadful affectation of indifference — “ but, really — so 
many — ” 

Horatio looked handsomely miserable. 

“ I shall be most happy,” simpered the interesting 
Teresa, at last. Horatio’s countenance brightened up, 
like an old hat in a shower of rain. 

“ A very genteel young man, certainly ! ” said the 
gratified Mr. Malderton, as the obsequious Sparkins 
and his partner joined the quadrille which was just 
forming. 

. “ He has a remarkably good address,” said Mr. Fred- 
erick. 

“ Yes, he is a prime fellow,” interposed Tom, who 
always managed to put his foot in it — “he talks just 
like an auctioneer.” 

“ Tom ! ” said his father solemnly, “ I think I desired 
you, before, not to be a fool.” Tom looked as happy as 
1 cock on a drizzly morning. 

“ How delightful ! ” said the interesting Horatio to his 
partner, as they promenaded the room at the conclusion 
the set — “how delightful, how refieshing it is, to 


HORATIO SPARKINS. 


147 


retire from the cloudy storms, the vicissitudes, and the 
troubles, of life, even if it be but for a few short fleeting 
moments ; and to spend those moments, fading and eva- 
nescent though they be, in the delightful, the blessed, 
society of one individual — whose frowns would be death, 
whose coldness would be madness, whose falsehood would 
be ruin, whose constancy would be bliss ; the possession 
of whose affection would be the brightest and best reward 
that Heaven could bestow on man ! ” 

“ What feeling ! what sentiment ! ” thought Miss 
Teresa, as she leaned more heavily on her companion’s 
arm. 

“ But enough — enough ! ” resumed the elegant Spar- 
kins, with a theatrical air. “ What have I said ? what 
have I — I — to do with sentiments like these ! Miss 
Malderton — ” here he stopped short — “ may I hope to 
be permitted to offer the humble tribute of — ” 

“ Really, Mr. Sparkins,” returned the enraptured 
Teresa, blushing in the sweetest confusion, “ I must refer 
you to papa. I never can, without his consent, venture 
to — ” 

“ Surely he cannot object — ” 

“ Oh, yes. Indeed, indeed, you know him not ! ” in- 
terrupted Miss Teresa, well knowing there was nothing 
to fear, but wishing to make the interview resemble a 
scene in some romantic novel. 

“ He cannot object to my offering you a glass of 
negus,” returned the adorable Sparkins, with some sur- 
prise. 

“ Is that all ? ” thought the disappointed Teresa. 

What a fuss about nothing ! ” 

“ It will give me the greatest pleasure, sir, to see you 
io dinner at Oak Lodge, Camberwell, on Sunday next at 


148 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


five o’clock, if you have no better engagement,” said Mr. 
Malderton, at the conclusion of the evening, as he and 
his sons were standing in conversation with Mr. Horatio 
Sparkins. ' ' * 

Horatio bowed his acknowledgments, and accepted the 
flattering invitation. 

“ I must confess,” continued the father, offering his 
snuff-box to his new acquaintance, “ that I don’t enjoy 
these assemblies half so much as the comfort — I had 
almost said the luxury — of Oak Lodge. They have no 
great charms for an elderly man.” 

“ And, after all, sir, what is man ? ” said the meta- 
physical Sparkins. “ I say, what is man ? ” 

“ Ah ! very true,” said Mr. Malderton ; “ very true.” 

“ We know that we live and breathe,” continued Ho- 
ratio ; “ that we have wants and wishes, desires and 
appetites — ” 

“ Certainly,” said Mr. Frederick Malderton, looking 
profound. 

“ I say, we know that we exist,” repeated Horatio, rais- 
ing his voice, “ but there, we stop ; there is an end to our 
knowledge ; there, is the summit of our attainments ; 
there, is the termination of our ends. What more do 
we know ? ” 

“Nothing,” replied Mr. Frederick — than whom no 
one was more capable of answering for himself in that 
particular. Tom was about to hazard something, but, 
fortunately for his reputation, he caught his father’s 
angry eye, and slunk off like a puppy convicted of petty 
larceny. 

“ Upon my word,” said Mr. Malderton the elder, as 
they were returning home in the Fly, “ that Mr. Spar- 
kins is a wonderful young man. Such surprising knowl- 


HORATIO SPARKINS. 


149 


edge ! such extraordinary information ! and such a splen- 
did mode of expressing himself! ” 

“ I think he must be somebody in disguise/' said Miss 
Marianne. “ How charmingly romantic I ” 

“ He talks very loud and nicely,” timidly observed 
Tom, “ but I don’t exactly understand what he means.’' 

“ I almost begin to despair of your understanding any- 
thing, Tom,” said his father, who, of course, had been 
much enlightened by Mr. Horatio Sparkins’ conversa- 
tion. 

“ It strikes me, Tom,” said Miss Teresa, “ that you 
have made yourself very ridiculous this evening.” 

“ No doubt of it,’' cried everybody — and the unfor- 
tunate Tom reduced himself into the least possible space. 
That night, Mr. and Mrs. Malderton had a long conver- 
sation respecting their daughter’s prospects and future 
arrangements. Miss Teresa went to bed, considering 
whether, in the event of her marrying a title, she could 
conscientiously encourage the visits of her present asso- 
ciates ; and dreamed, all night, of disguised noblemen, 
large routs, ostrich plumes, bridal favors, and Horatio 
Sparkins. 

Various surmises were hazarded on the Sunday morn- 
ing, as to the mode of conveyance which the anxiously 
expected Horatio would adopt. Did he keep a gig ? — 
was it possible he could come on horseback ? — or would 
he patronize the stage ? These, and various other con- 
jectures of equal importance, engrossed the attention of 
Mrs. IVIalderton and her daughters during the whole 
morning after church. 

“ Upon my word, my dear, it’s a most annoying thing 
that that vulgar brother of yours should have invited 
Skimself to dine here to-day,” said Mr. Malderton to his 


150 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


wife. “On account of Mr. Sparkins’s coming down, 1 
purposely abstained from asking anyone but Flamwell. 
And then to think of your brother — a tradesman — it^s 
insufferable ! I declare I wouldn’t have him mention his 
shop, before our new guest — no, not for a thousand 
pounds ! I wouldn’t care if he had the good sense to 
conceal the disgrace he is to the family ; but he’s so fond 
of his horrible business, that he will let people know' 
what he is.” 

Mr. Jacob Barton, the individual alluded to, was a 
large grocer ; so vulgar, and so lost to all sense of feel- 
ing, that he actually never scrupled to avow that he 
wasn’t above his business : “ he’d made his money by it, 
and he didn’t care w'ho know’d it.” 

“ Ah ! Flamwell, my dear fellow, how d’ye do ? ” said 
Mr. Malderton, as a little spoffish man, with green spec 
tacles, entered the room. “ You got my note ? ” 

“ Yes, I did ; and here I am in consequence.” 

“ You don’t happen to know this Mr. Sparkins by 
name ? You know everybody ? ” 

Mr. Flamw'ell w'as one of those gentlemen of remark- 
ably extensive information whom one occasionally meets 
in society, who pretend to know everybody, but in reality 
know nobody. At Malderton’s, where any stories about 
great people were received with a greedy ear, he w'as 
an especial favorite ; and, knowing the kind of people 
he had to deal with, he carried his passion of claiming 
acquaintance with everybody to the most immoderate 
'ength. He had rather a singular way of telling his 
greatest lies in a parenthesis, and with an air of self- 
denial, as if he feared being thought egotistical. 

“ Why, no, I don’t know' him by that name,” returned 
Flamwell, in a low tone, and with an air of immense 


HORATIO SPARKINS. 


151 


importance. “ I have no doubt J know him, though. 
Is he tall ? ” 

“ Middle-sized,’’ said Miss Teresa. 

“ With black hair ? ” inquired Flamwell, hazarding a 
bold guess. 

“ Yes,” returned Miss Teresa, eagerly. 

“ Rather a snub nose ? ” 

“ No,” said the disappointed Teresa, “ he has a Roman 
nose.” 

“ I said a Roman nose, didn’t I ? ” inquired Flamwell. 
“ He’s an elegant young man ? ” 

‘‘Oh, certainly.” 

“ With remarkably prepossessing manners ? ” 

“ Oh, yes ! ” said all the family together. “ You must 
know him.” 

“ Yes, I thought you knew him, if he was anybody,” 
triumphantly exclaimed Mr. Malderton. “Who d’ye 
think he is ? ” 

“ Why, from your description,” said Flamwell, rumi- 
nating, and sinking his voice, almost to a whisper, “ he 
bears a strong resemblance to the Honorable Augustus 
Fitz-Edward Fitz-John Fitz-Osborne. He’s a very tal- 
ented young man, and rather eccentric. It’s extremely 
probable he may have changed his name for some tempo- 
rary purpose.” 

Teresa’s heart beat high. Could he be the Honorable 
Augustus Fitz-Edward Fitz-John Fitz-Osborne ! What 
a name to be elegantly engraved upon two glazed cards, 
tied together with a piece of white satin ribbon ! “ The 

Honorable Mrs. Augustus Fitz-Edward Fitz-John Fitz- 
Osborne ! ” The thought was transport. 

“ It’s five minutes to five,” said Mr. Malderton, looking 
at his watch : “ I hope he’s not going to disappoint us.” 


152 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


“ There he is ! ” exclaimed Miss Teresa, as a loud 
double-knock was heard at the door. Everybody en- 
deavored to look — as people when they particularly 
expect a visitor always do — as if they were perfectly 
unsuspicious of the approach of anybody. 

The room-door opened — “ Mr. Barton ! ” said the 
servant. 

“ Confound the man ! ” murmured Malderton. “ Ah ! 
my dear sir, how d’ye do ! Any news ? ” 

“ Why no,” returned the grocer, in his usual bluff 
manner. “ No, none partickler. None that I am much 
aware of. How d’ye do, gals and boys? Mr. Flamwell, 
sir — glad to see you.” 

“ Here’s Mr. Sparkins ! ” said Tom, who had been 
looking oiit at the window, “ on such a black horse ! ” 
There was Horatio, sure enough, on a large black horse, 
curveting and prancing along, like an Astley’s supernu- 
merary. After a great deal of reining in, and pulling 
up, with the accompaniments of snorting, rearing, and 
kicking, the animal consented to stop at about a hundred 
yards from the gate, where Mr. Sparkins dismounted, and 
confided him to the care of Mr. Malderton’s groom. The 
ceremony of introduction was gone through, in all due 
form. Mr. Flam vv ell looked from behind his green 
spectacles at Horatio with an air of mysterious impor- 
tance ; and the gallant Horatio looked unutterable things 
at Teresa. 

“ Is he the Honorable Mr. Augustus what’s his 
name ? ” whispered Mrs. Malderton to Flamwell, as he 
was escorting her to the dining-room. 

Why, no — at least not exactly,” returned that great 
authority — “ not exactly.” 

“ Who is he then ? ” 


HORATIO SPARKINS. 


153 


** Hush ! ” said Flam well, nodding his head with a 
grave air, importing that he knew very well ; but was 
prevented, by some grave reasons of state, from disclos- 
ing the important secret. It might be one of the minis- 
ters making himself acquainted with the views of the 
people. 

“ Mr. Sparkins,” said the delighted Mrs. Malderton, 
“ pray divide the ladies. John, put a chair for the gen- 
tleman between Miss Teresa and Miss Marianne.” This 
was addressed to a man who, on ordinary occasions, acted 
as half-groom, half-gardener ; but who, as it was impor- 
tant to make an impression on Mr. Sparkins, had been 
forced into a white neckerchief and shoes, and touched 
up, and brushed, to look like a second footman. 

The dinner was excellent ; Horatio was most attentive 
to Miss Teresa, and everyone felt in high spirits, except 
Mr. Malderton, who, knowing the propensity of his 
brother-in-law, Mr. Barton, endured that sort of agony 
which the newspapers inform us is experienced by the 
surrounding neighborhood when a pot-boy hangs himself 
in a hay-loft, and which is “ much easier to be imagined 
than described.” 

“ Have you seen your friend. Sir Thomas Noland, 
lately, Flamwell ? ” inquired Mr. Malderton, casting a 
sidelong look at Horatio, to see what effect the mention 
of so great a man had upon him. 

“ Why, no — not very lately. I saw Lord Gubbleton 
the day before yesterday.” 

“ Ah ! I hope his lordship is very well ? ” said Malder- 
ton, in a tone of the greatest interest. It is scarcely ne- 
cessary to say that, until that moment, he had been quite 
innocent of the existence of such a person. 

“Why, yes ; he was very well — very well indeed. 


154 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


He’s a devilish good fellow. T met him in the City, and 
had a lone: chat with him. Indeed, Fm rather intimate 
with him. I couldn’t stop to talk to him as long as I 
could wish, though, because I was on my way to a bank- 
er’s, a very rich man, and a member of Parliament, with 
whom I am also rather, indeed I may say very, inti- 
mate.” 

“ I know whom you mean,” returned the host, con- 
sequentially — in reality knowing as much about the 
matter as Flamwell himself. “ He has a capital busi- 
ness.” 

This was touching on a dangerous topic. 

“ Talking of business,” interposed Mr. Barton, from 
the centre of the table. “ A gentleman whom you 
knew very well, Malderton, before you made that first 
lucky spec of yours, called at our shop the other day, 
and — ” 

“ Barton, may I .trouble you for a potato,” interrupted 
the wretched master of the house, hoping to nip the story 
in the bud. 

“ Certainly,” returned the grocer, quite insensible of 
his brother-in-law’s object — “ and he said in a very 
plain manner — ” 

“ Floury, if you please,” interrupted Malderton again ; 
dreading the termination of the anecdote, and fearing a 
repetition of the word “ shop.” 

“ He said, says he,” continued the culprit, after de- 
^ pntching the potato ; “ says he, how goes on your busi- 
ness ? So T said, jokingly — you know my w'ay — says 
1, I’m never above my business, and I hope my business 
will never be above me. Ha, ha ! ” 

“ Mr. Sparkins,” said the host, vainly endeavoring to 
conceal his dismay, “ a glass of wine ? ” 


HORATIO SPARKINS. 


155 


* With the utmost pleasure, sir.” 

“ Happy to see you.” 

Thank you.” 

“We were talking the other evening,” resumed the 
host, addressing .Horatio, partly with the view of dis- 
playing the conversational powers of his new acquaint- 
ance, and partly in the hope of drowning the grocer’s 
stories — “ we were talking the other night about the 
nature of man. Your argument struck me very forcibly.” 

“And me,” said Mr. Frederick. Horatio made a 
graceful inclination of the head. 

“ Pray, what is your opinion of woman, Mr. Spar- 
kins ? ” inquired Mrs. 'Malderton. The young ladies 
simpered. 

“ Man,” replied Horatio, “ man, whether he ranged 
the bright, gay, flowery plains of a second Eden, or the 
more sterile, barren, and I may say commonplace re- 
gions, to which we are compelled to accustom ourselves, 
in times such as these ; man, under any circumstance, or 
in any place — whether he were bending beneath the 
withering blasts of the frigid zone, or scorching under 
the rays of a vertical sun — man, without woman, would 
be — alone.” 

“ I am very happy to find you entertain such honor- 
able opinions, Mr. Sparkins^’ said Mrs. Malderton. 

“ And I,” added Miss Teresa. Horatio looked his de- 
light, and the young lady blushed. 

“ Now it’s my opinion,” said Mr. Barton — 

“ I know what you’re going to say,” interposed Mal- 
derton, determined not to give his relation, another oppor- 
tunity, “ and I don’t agree with you.” 

“ What ? ” inquired the astonislied grocer. 

“ T am sorry to differ from you. Barton,” said the host. 


156 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


in as positive a manner as if he really were contradict- 
ing a position which the other had laid down, ‘‘Jbut I 
cannot give my assent to what I consider a very monstrous 
proposition.” 

“ But I meant to say — ” 

“ You never can convince me,” said Malderton, with 
an air of obstinate determination. “ Never.” 

“And I,” said Mr. Frederick, following up his father’s 
attack, “cannot entirely agree in Mr. Sparkins’s argu- 
ment.” 

“ What ! ” said Horatio, who became more metaphysi- 
cal, and more argumentative, as he saw the female part 
of the family listening in wondering delight — “What! 
Is effect the consequence of cause? Is cause the pre- 
cursor of effect?” 

“ That’s the point,” said Flamwell. 

“ To be sure,” said Mr. Malderton. 

“ Because, if effect is the consequence of cause, and if 
cause does precede effect, I apprehend you are wrong,” 
added Horatio. 

“ Decidedly,” said the toad-eating Flamwell. 

“ At least, I apprehend that to be the just and logical 
deduction ? ” said Sparkins, in a tone of interrogation. 

“ No doubt of it,” chimed in Flamwell again. “ It 
settles the point.” ^ 

“ Well, perhaps it does,” said Mr. Frederick ; “ I 
idn’t see it before.” 

“ I don’t exactly see it now,” thought the grocer ; 

but I suppose it’s all right.” 

“ How wonderfully clever he is ! ” whispered Mrs. 
Malderton to her daughters, as they retired to the 
Irawing-room., 

“ Oh, he’s quite a love ! ” said both the young ladies 


HORATIO S PARKINS. 


157 


together ; “ he talks like an oracle. He must have seen 
a great deal of life ! ” 

The gentlemen being left to themselves, a pause en- 
sued, during which everybody looked very grave, as if 
they were quite overcome by the profound nature of the 
previous discussion. Flam well, who had made up his 
mind to find out who and what Mr. Horatio Sparkins 
really was, first broke silence. 

Excuse me, sir,” said that distinguished personage, 
“ I presume you have studied for the bar ? I thought 
of entering once, myself — indeed, I’m rather intimate 
with some of the highest ornaments of that distinguished 
profession.” 

N — no !” said Horatio, with a little hesitation; “not 
exactly.” 

“ But you have been much among the silk gowns, or I 
mistake ? ” inquired Flamwell, deferentially. 

“ Nearly all my life,” returned Sparkins. 

The question was thus pretty well settled in the mind 
of Mr. Flamwell. He was a young gentleman “ about 
to be called.” 

“ I shouldn’t like to be a barrister,” said Tom, speak- 
ing for the first time, and looking round the table to find 
somebody who would notice the remark. 

No one made any reply. 

“ I shouldn’t like to wear a wig,” said Tom, hazarding 
another observation. 

“ Tom, I beg you will not make yourself ridiculous,” 
.<aid his father. “ Pray listen, and improve yourself by 
the conversation you hear, and don’t be constantly mak- 
ing these absurd remarks.” 

“ Very well, father,” replied the unfortunate Tom, who 
lad not spoken a word since he had asked for another 


158 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


slice of beef at a quarter past five o’clock p. m., and it 
was then eight. • 

“ Well, Tom,” observed his good-natured unele, “ nevei 
mind ! I think with you. 1 shouldn’t like to wear a 
wig. I’d rather wear an apron.” 

Mr. Malderton coughed violently. Mr. Barton re- 
sumed — “ For if a man’s above his business — ” 

The cough returned with tenfold violence, and did not 
c-ease until the unfortunate cause of it, in his alarm, had 
quite forgotten what he intended to say. 

“ Mr. Sparkins,” said Flamwell, returning to the 
charge, “ do you happen to know Mr. Delafontaine, of 
Bedford Square ? ” 

“ I have exchanged cards with him ; since which, in- 
deed, I have had an opportunity of serving him consid- 
erably,” replied Horatio, slightly coloring ; no doubt, at 
having been betrayed into making the acknowledgment. 

“ You are very lucky, if you have had an opportunity 
of obliging that great man,” observed Flamwell, with an 
air of profound respect. 

“ I don’t know who he is,” he whispered to Mr. Mal- 
derton, confidentially, as they followed Horatio up to the 
drawing-room. “ It’s quite clear, however, that he be- 
longs to the law, and that he is somebody of great impor- 
tance, and very highly connected.” 

“ No doubt, no doubt,” retunied his companion. 

The remainder of the evening passed away most de- 
lightfully. Mr. Malderton, relieved from his apprehen- 
sions by the circumstance of Mr. Barton’s falling into a 
profound sleep, was as affable and gracious as possible. 
Miss Teresa played the “ Fall of Paris,” as Mr. Spar- 
kins declared, in a most masterly manner, and both of 
\hem, assisted by Mr. Frederick, tried over glees and 


HORATIO SPARKINS. 


159 


trios without number ; they having made the pleasing 
discovery that their voices harmonized beautifully. To 
be sure, they all sang the first part ; and Horatio, in ad- 
dition to the slight drawback of having no ear, was per- 
fectly innocent of knowing a note of music ; still, they 
passed the time very agreeably, and it was past twelve 
o’clock before Mr. Sparkins ordered the mourning-coach- 
looking steed to be brought out — an order which was 
only complied with on the distinct understanding that he 
was to repeat his visit on the following Sunday. 

“ But, perhaps, Mr. Sparkins will form one of our 
party to-morrow evening ? ” suggested Mrs. M. “ Mr. 
Malderton intends taking the girls to see the panto- 
mime.” Mr. Sparkins bowed, and promised to join the 
party in box 48, in the course of the evening. 

“ We will not tax you for the morning,” said Miss 
Teresa, bewitchingly ; “ for ma is going to take us to all 
sorts of places, shopping. I know that gentlemen have 
a great horror of that employment.” Mi*. Sparkins 
bowed again, and declared that he should be delighted, 
but business of importance occupied him in the morning. 
Flam well looked at Malderton significantly — r- ‘‘ It’s term 
time ! ” he whispered. 

At twelve o’clock on the following morning, the “ fly ” 
was at the door of Oak Lodge, to convey Mrs. Malderton 
and her daughters on their expedition for the day. They 
were to dine and dress for the play at a friend’s house. 
First, driving thither with their bandboxes, they de- 
parted on their first errand to make some purchases at 
Messrs. Jones, Spruggins, and Smith’s, of Tottenham 
Court Road ; after which they were to go to Red- 
may ne’s in Bond Street ; thence, to innumerable places 
that no one ever heard of. The young ladies beguiled 


160 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. ' 


the tediousness of the ride by eulogizing Mr. Horatio 
Sparkins, scolding their mamma for taking them so far to 
save a shilling, and wondering whether they should ever 
reach their destination. At length, the vehicle stopped 
before a dirty looking ticketed linen-draper’s shop, with 
goods of all kinds, and labels of all sorts and sizes, in 
the window. There were dropsical figures of seven with 
a little three-farthings in the corner ; “ perfectly invisible 
to the naked eye ; ” three hundred and fifty thousand 
ladies’ boas, from one shilling and a penny halfpenny ; 
real French kid shoes, at two and ninepence per pair ; 
green parasols, at an equally cheap rate ; and “ every 
description of goods,” as the proprietors said — and they 
must know best — “ fifty per cent, under cost-price.” 

“ Lor ! ma, what a place you have brought us to ! ” 
said Miss Teresa ; “ what would IVIr. Sparkins say if he 
could see us ! ” 

“ Ah ! what, indeed ! ” said Miss Marianne, horrified 
at the idea. 

“ Pray be seated, ladies. What is the first article ? ” 
inquired the obsequious master of the ceremonies of the 
establishment, who, in his large white neckcloth and 
formal tie, looked like a bad “ portrait of a gentleman ” 
in the Somerset House exhibition. 

“ I want to see some silks,” answered Mrs. Malderton. 

“ Directly, ma’am. — Mr. Smith ! Where is Mr. 
Smith ? ” 

“ Here, sir,” cried a voice at the back of the shop. 

“ Pray make haste, Mr. Smith,” said the M. C. “ You 
never are to be found when you’re wanted, sir.” 

Mr. Smith, thus enjoined to use all possible despatch, 
leaped over the counter with great agility, and placed 
tiimself iK'forc the newly arrived customers. Mrs. Mai- 


HORATIO SPARKINS. 


161 


derton uttered a faint scream ; Miss Teresa, who had 
been stooping down to talk to her sister, raised her head, 
and beheld — Horatio Sparkins ! 

“We will draw a veil,” as novel-writers say, over the 
scene that ensued. The mysterious, philosophical, ro- 
mantic, metaphysical Sparkins — he who, to the interest- 
ing Teresa, seemed like the embodied idea of the young 
dukes and poetical exquisites in blue silk dressing-gowns, 
and ditto ditto slippers, of whom she had read and 
dreamed, but had never expected to behold, was sud- 
denly converted into Mr. Samuel Smith, the assistant at 
a “ cheap shop ; ” the junior partner in a slippery firm 
of some three weeks’ existence. The dignified evanish- 
ment of the hero of Oak Lodge, on this unexpected 
recognition, could only be equalled by that of a furtive 
dog with a considerable kettle at his tail. All the hopes 
of the Maldertons were destined at once to melt away, 
like the lemon ices at a Company’s dinner; Almacks 
was still to them as distant as the North Pole ; and Miss 
Teresa had as much chance of a husband as Captain 
Ross had of the northwest passage. 

Years have elapsed since the occurrence of this dread- 
ful morning. The daisies have thrice bloomed on Cam- 
berwell Green ; the sparrows have thrice repeated their 
vernal chirps in Camberwell Grove ; but the Miss Mal- 
dertons are still unmated. Miss Teresa’s case is more 
desperate than ever ; but Flam well is yet in the zenith 
of his reputation ; and the family have the same predi- 
lection for aristocratic personages, with an increased 
aversion to anything low. 


VOL. II. 


11 


162 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


CHAPTER VL 

THE BLACK VEIL. 

One winter’s evening towards the close of the year 
1800, or within a year or two of that time, a young 
medical practitioner, recently established in business, 
was seated by a cheerful fire, in his little parlor, listen- 
ing to the wind which w'as beating the rain in pattering 
drops against the window, and rumbling dismally in the 
chimney. The night was wet and cold ; he had been 
walking through mud and water the whole day, and was 
now comfortably reposing in his dressing-gown and slip- 
pers, more than half asleep and less than half awake, 
revolving a thousand matters in his wandering imagina- 
tion. First, he thought how hard the wind was blowing, 
and how the cold, sharp rain would be at that moment 
beating in his face, if he were nol comfortably housed at 
home. Then, his mind reverted to his annual Christmas 
visit to his native place and dearest friends ; he thought 
how glad they would all be to see him, and how happy 
it would make Rose if he could only tell her that he had 
found a patient at last, and hoped to have more, and to 
come down again, in a few months’ time, and marry her, 
and take her home to gladden his lonely fireside, and 
stimulate him to fresh exertions. Then, he began to 
wonder when his first patient would appear, or whether 
fie was destined, by a special dispensation of Providence, 
never to have any patients at all ; and then, he thought 
about Rose again, and dropped to sleep and dreamed 


THE BLACK VEIL. 


163 


^bout her, till the tones of her sweet merry voice sounded 
in his ears, and her soft tiny hand rested on his shoulder. 

There loas a hand upon his shoulder, but it was neithei 
soft nor tiny ; its owner being a corpulent round-headed 
boy, who, in consideration of the sum of one shilling per 
week and his food, was let out by the parish to carry 
medicine and messages. As there was no demand for 
the medicine, however, and no necessity for the mes- 
sages, he usually occupied his unemployed hours ^ — 
averaging fourteen a day — in abstracting peppermint 
drops, taking animal nourishment, and going to sleep. 

“ A lady, sir — a lady ! ” whispered the boy, rousing 
his master with a shake. 

“ What lady ? ” cried our friend, starting up, not quite 
certain that his dream was an illusion, and half expect- 
ing that it might be Kose herself. — “ What lady ? 
Where ?»’ 

“ There, sir ! ” replied the boy, pointing to the glass 
door leading into the surgery, with an expression of 
alarm which the very unusual apparition of a customer 
might have tended to excite. 

The surgeon looked towards the door, and started him- 
self, for an instant, on beholding the appearance of his 
unlooked-for visitor. 

It was a singularly tall woman, dressed in deep mourn- 
ing, and standing so close to the door that her face almost 
touched the glass. The upper part of her figure was care- 
fully muffled in a black shawl, as if for the purpose of 
concealment ; and her face was shrouded by a thick black 
veil. She stood perfectly erect ; her figure was drawn 
ap to its full height, and though the surgeon felt that the 
eyes beneath the veil were fixed on him, she stood per- 
fectly motionless, and evinced, by no gesture whatever, 


164 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


the slightest consciousness of his having turned towards 
her. 

“ Do you wish to consult me ? ” he inquired, with some 
hesitation, holding open the door. It opened inwards, 
and therefore the action (Jid not alter the position of the 
figure, which still remained motionless on the same 
spot. 

She slightly inclined her head in token of acqui- 
escence. 

Pray walk in,” said the surgeon. 

The figure moved a step forward ; and then, turning 
its head in the direction of the boy — to his infinite hor- 
ror — appeared to hesitate. 

“ Leave the room, Tom,” said the young man, address- 
ing the boy, whose large round eyes had been extended 
to their utmost width during this brief interview. “ Draw 
the curtain, and shut the door.” 

The boy drew a green curtain across the glass part of 
the door, retired into the surgery, closed the door after 
him, and immediately applied one of his large eyes to 
the keyhole on the other side. 

The surgeon drew a chair to the lire, and motioned 
the visitor to a seat. The mysterious figure slowly 
moved towards it. As the blaze shone upon the black 
dress, the surgeon observed that the bottom of it was 
saturated with mud and rain. 

“ You are very wet,” he said. 

“ I am,” said the stranger, in a low deep voice. 

“ And you are ill ? ” added the surgeon, compassion- 
ately, for the tone was that of a person in pain. 

“ I am,” was the reply — “ very ill : not bodily, but 
nentally. It is not for myself, or on my own behalf,” 
continued the stranger, “ that I come to you. If T 


THE BLACK VEIL. 


165 


labored under bodily disease, I should not be out, alone, 
at such an hour, or on such a night as this; and if I 
were afflicted with it, twenty-four hours hence, God 
knows how gladly I would lie down and pray to die. 
It is for another that I beseech your aid, sir. I may be 
mad to ask it for him — I think I am ; but, night after 
night through the long dreary hours of watching and 
weeping, the thought has been ever present to my mind ; 
and though even I see the hopelessness of human assist- 
ance availing him, the bare thought of laying him in his 
grave without it makes my blood run cold ! ” And a 
shudder, such as the surgeon well knew art could not 
produce, trembled through the speaker’s frame. 

There was a desperate earnestness in this woman’s 
manner, that went to the young man’s heart. He was 
young in his profession, and had not yet witnessed enough 
of the miseries which are daily presented before the eyes 
of its members, to have grown comparatively callous to 
human suffering. 

“ If,” he said, rising hastily, ‘‘ the person of whom you 
speak be in so hopeless a condition as you describe, not 
a moment is to be lost. I will go with you instantly. 
Why did you not obtain medical advice before ? ” 

“ Because it would have been useless before — be- 
cause it is useless even now,” replied the woman, clasp- 
ing her hands passionately. 

The surgeon gazed, for a moment, on the black veil, 
as if to ascertain the expression of the features beneath 
it ; its thickness, however, rendered such a result impos- 
sible. 

“ You are ill,” he said, gently, “ although you do not 
know it. The fever which has enabled you to bear, 
without feeling, the fatigue you have evidently under- 


166 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


gone, is burning within you now. Put that to your lips,* 
he continued, pouring out a glass of w'ater — “ compose 
yourself for a few moments, and then tell me, as calmly 
as you can, what the disease of the patient is, and how 
long he has been ill. When I know what it is necessary 
1 should know, to render my visit serviceable to him, I 
am ready to accompany you.” 

The stranger lifted the glass of water to her mouth, 
without raising the veil ; put it down again, untasted ; 
and burst into tears. 

“ I know,” she said, sobbing aloud, “ that what I say 
to you now seems like the ravings of fever. I have 
been told so before, less kindly than by you. I am not 
a young woman ; and they do say, that as life steals on 
towards its final close, the last short remnant, worthless 
as it may seem to all beside, is dearer to its possessor 
than all the years that have gone before, connected 
though they be with the recollection of old friends 
long since dead, and young ones — children perhaps — 
who have fallen off from, and forgotten one as com- 
pletely as if they had died too. My natural term of 
life cannot be many years longer, and should be dear on 
that account ; but I would lay it down without a sigh — 
with cheerfulness — with joy — if what I tell you now 
were only false, or imaginary. To-morrow morning, he 
of whom I speak will be, I know, though I would fain 
think otherwise, beyond the reach of human aid ; and 
yet, to-night, though he is in deadly peril, you must not 
see, and could not serve, him.” 

“ I am unwilling to increase your distress,” said the 
surgeon, after a short pause, “ by making any comment 
on what you have just said, or appearing desirous to in- 
vestigate a subject you are so anxious to conceal ; but 


THE BLACK VEIL. 


167 


there is an inconsistency in your statement which I can- 
not reconcile with probability. This person is dying 
to-night, and I cannot see him when my assistance might 
possibly avail ; you apprehend it will be useless to-mor- 
row, and yet you would have me see him then ! If he 
be, indeed, as dear to you as your words and manner 
would imply, why not try to save his life before delay 
and the progress of his disease render it impracticable ? ” 
“ God help me ! ” exclaimed the woman, weeping bit- 
terly, “ how can I hope strangers will believe what ap- 
peal’s incredible even to myself? You will not see him 
then, sir ? ” she added, rising suddenly. 

“ I did not say that I declined to see him,” replied the 
Burgeon ; “ but I warn you, that if you persist in this 
extraordinary procrastination, and the individual dies, a 
fearful responsibility rests with you.” 

“ The responsibility will rest heavily somewhere,” re- 
plied the stranger bitterly. “ Whatever responsibility 
rests with me, I am content to bear, and ready to an- 
swer.” 

As I incur none,” continued the surgeon, “ by acced- 
ing to your request, I will see him in the morning, if 
you leave me the address. And what hour can he be 
seen ? ” 

■ Nine^' replied the stranger. 

“ You must excuse my pressing these inquiries,” said 
the surgeon. But is he in your charge now ? ” 

“ He is not,” was her rejoinder. 

“ Then, if I gave you instructions for his treatment 
through the night, you could not assist him ? ” 

The woman wept bitterly, as she replied, I could 
not.” 

Finding that there was but little prospect of obtaining 


168 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


more information by prolonging the interview ; and anx 
ions to spare the woman’s feelings, which, subdued at 
first by a violent ejffort, were now irrepressible and most 
painful to witness ; the surgeon repeated his promise of 
calling in the morning at the appointed hour. His 
visitor, after giving him a direction to an obscure part 
of Walworth, left the house in the same mysterious 
manner in which she had entered it. 

It will be readily believed that so extraordinary a visit 
produced a considerable impression on the mind of the 
young surgeon ; and that he speculated a great deal and 
to very little purpose on the possible circumstances of 
the case. In common with the generality of people, he 
had often heard and read of singular instances, in which 
a presentiment of death, at a particular day, or even 
minute, had been entertained and realized. At one 
moment he was inclined to think that the present might 
be such a case ; but, then, it occurred to him that all the 
anecdotes of the kind he had ever heard were of persons 
who had been troubled with a foreboding of their own 
death. This woman, however, spoke of another person 
— a man ; and it was impossible to suppose that a mere 
dream or delusion of fancy would induce her to speak 
of his approaching dissolution with such terrible cer- 
tainty as she had spoken. It could not be that the man 
was to be murdered in the morning, and that the woman, 
originally a consenting party, and bound to secrecy by an 
oath, had relented, and, though unable to prevent the 
commission of some outrage on the victim, had deter- 
mined to prevent his death if possible, by the timely 
'nterposition of medical aid ? The idea of such things 
happening within two miles of the metropolis appeared 
too wild and preposterous to be entertained beyond the 


THE BLACK VEIL. 


169 


instant. Then, his original impression that the woman’s 
intellects were disordered, recurred ; and, as it was the 
only mode of solving the difficulty with any degree of 
satisfaction, he obstinately made up his mind to believe 
that she was mad. Certain misgivings upon this point, 
however, stole upon his thoughts at the time, and pre- 
sented themselves again and again through the long dull 
course of a sleepless night : during which, in spite of all 
his efforts to the contrary, he was unable to banish the 
black veil from his disturbed imagination. 

The back part of Walworth, at its greatest distance 
from town, is a straggling miserable place enough, even in 
these days ; but five-and-thirty years ago, the greater 
portion of it was little better than a dreary Avaste, in- 
habited by a few scattered people of questionable char- 
acter, whose poverty prevented their living in any better 
neighborhood, or whose pursuits and mode of life ren- 
dered its solitude desirable. Very many of the houses 
which have since sprung up on all sides were not built 
until some years afterwards ; and the great majority 
even of those which were sprinkled about, at irregular 
intervals, were of the rudest and most miserable descrip- 
tion. 

The appearance of the place through which he walked 
in the morning Avas not calculated to raise the spirits of 
the young surgeon, or to dispel any feeling of anxiety 
or depression which the singular kind of .visit he Avas 
about to make had awakened. Striking off from the 
high road, his way lay across a marshy common, through 
irregular lanes, with here and there a ruinous and dis- 
mantled cottage fast falling to pieces Avith decay and 
neglect. A stunted treev or pool of stagnant Avater, 
roused into a sluggish action by the heavy rain of the 


170 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


preceding night, skirted the path occasionally ; and, now 
and then, a miserable patch of garden-ground, with a 
few old boards knocked together for a summer-house, 
and old palings imperfectly mended with stakes pilfered 
from the neighboring hedges, bore testimony, at once, 
to the poverty of the inhabitants, and the little scruple 
they entertained in appropriating the property of other 
people to their own use. Occasionally, a filthy looking 
woman would make her appearance from the door of a 
dirty house, to empty the contents of some cooking 
utensil into the gutter in front, or to scream after a little 
slip-shod girl who had contrived to stagger a few yards 
from the door under the weight of a sallow infant almost 
as big as herself ; but, scarcely anything was stirring 
around ; and so much of the prospect as could be faintly 
traced through the cold damp mist which hung heavily 
over it, presented a lonely and dreary appearance per- 
fectly in keeping with the objects we have described. 

After plodding wearily through the mud and mire ; 
making many inquiries for the place to which he had 
been directed ; and receiving as many contradictory and 
unsatisfactory replies in return ; the young man at length 
arrived before the house which had been pointed out to 
him as the object of his destination. It was a small low 
building, one story above the ground, with even a more 
desolate and unpromising exterior than any he had yet 
passed. An old yellow curtain was closely drawn across 
the window up-stairs, and the parlor shutters were closed, 
but not fastened. The house was detached from any 
other, and, as it stood at an angle of a narrow lane, 
there was no other habitation in sight. 

When we say that the surgeon hesitated, and walked 
% few paces beyond the house, before he could prevail 


THE BLACK VEIL. 


171 


upon himself to lift the knocker, we say nothing, that 
need raise a smile upon the face of the boldest reader 
The police of London were a very different body in that 
day ; the isolated position of the suburbs, when the rage 
for building and the progress of improvement had not 
yet begun to connect them with the main body of the 
city and its environs, rendered many of them (and this 
in particular) a place of resort for the worst and most 
depraved characters. Even the streets in the gayest 
parts of London were imperfectly lighted at that time, 
and such places as these were left entirely at the mercy 
of the moon and stars. The chances of detecting des- 
perate characters, or of tracing them to their haunts, 
were thus rendered very few, and their offences naturally 
increased in boldness, as the consciousness of compara- 
tive security became the more impressed upon them by 
daily experience. Added to these considerations, it must 
be remembered that the young man had spent some time 
in the public hospitals of the metropolis ; and, although 
neither Burke nor Bishop had then gained a horrible 
notoriety, his own observation might have suggested to 
him how easily the atrocities to which the former has 
since given his name might be committed. Be this as 
it may, whatever reflection made him hesitate, he did 
hesitate ; but, being a young man of strong mind and 
great personal courage, it was only for an instant ; — he 
stepped briskly back, and knocked gently at the door. 

A low Avhispering was audible, immediately after- 
ivards, as if some person at the end of the passage were 
conversing stealthily with another on the landing above. 
It was succeeded by the noise of a pair of heavy boots 
jpon the bare floor. Tlie door-chain was softly unfas- 
tened ; the door opened ; and a tall, ill-favored man, with 


172 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


black hair, and a face as the surgeon often declared 
afterwards as pale and haggard as the countenance of 
any dead man he ever saw, presented himself. 

“ Walk in, sir,” he said in a low tone. 

The surgeon did so, and the man, having secured the 
door again, by the chain, led the way to a small back 
parlor at the extremity of the passage. - 

“ Am I in time ? ” 

“ Too soon ! ” replied the man. The surgeon turned 
hastily round, with a gesture of astonishment not un- 
mixed with alarm, which he found it impossible to re- 
press. 

“ If you’ll step in here, sir,” said the man, who had 
evidently noticed the action — “if you’ll step in here, 
sir, you won’t be detained five minutes, I assure you.” 

The surgeon at once walked into the room. The man 
closed the door, and left him alone. 

It was a little cold room, with no other furniture than 
two deal chairs, and a table of the same material. A 
handful of fire, unguarded by any fender, was burning in 
the grate, which brought out the damp if it served no 
more comfortable purpose, for the unwholesome moisture 
was stealing down the walls, in long, slug-like tracks. 
The window, which was broken and patched in many 
places, looked into a small enclosed piece of ground, 
almost covered with water. Not a sound was to be 
heard, either within the house, or without. The young 
surgeon sat down by the fireplace, to await the result of 
his first professional visit. 

He had not remained in this position many minutes, 
when the noise of some approaching vehicle struck his 
car. It stopped ; the street-door was opened ; a low 
.alking succeeded, accompanied with a shuffling noise of 


THE BLACK VEIL. 


173 


footsteps, along the passage and on the stairs, as if two 
or three men were engaged in carrying some heavy body 
to the room above. The creaking of the stairs, a few 
seconds afterwards, announced that the new comers hav- 
ing completed their task, whatever it was, were leaving 
the house. The door was again closed, and the former 
silence was restored. 

Another five minutes elapsed, and the surgeon had 
resolved to explore the house, in search of some one to 
whom he might make his errand known, when the room- 
door opened, and his last night’s visitor, dressed in ex- 
actly the same manner, with the veil lowered as before, 
motioned him to advance. The singular height of her 
form, coupled with the circumstance of her not speaking, 
caused the idea to pass across his brain, for an instant, 
that it might be a man disguised in woman’s attire. The 
hysteric sobs which issued from beneath the veil, and the 
convulsive attitude of grief of the whole figure, how- 
ever, at once exposed the absurdity of the suspicion ; 
and he hastily followed. 

The woman led the way up-stairs to the front room, 
and paused at the door, to let him enter first. It was 
scantily furnished with an old deal box, a few chairs, and 
a tent bedstead, without hangings or cross-rails, which 
was covered with a patchwork counterpane. The dim 
light admitted through the curtain which he had noticed 
from the outside, rendered the objects in the room so in- 
distinct, and communicated to all of them so uniform a 
hue, that he did not, at first, perceive the object on which 
ftis eye at once rested when the woman rushed franti- 
cally past him, and fiung herself on her knees by the 
Dedside. 

Stretched upon the bed, closely enveloped in a linen 


174 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


wrapper, and covered with blankets, lay a human form, 
stiff and motionless. The head and face, which were 
those of a man, were uncovered, save by -a bandage 
which passed over the head and under the chin. The 
eyes were closed. The left arm lay heavily across the 
bed, and the woman held the passive hand. 

The surgeon gently pushed the woman aside, and took 
the hand in his. 

“ My God ! ” he exclaimed, letting it fall involuntarily 
— “ the man is dead ! ” 

The woman started to her feet and beat her hands to- 
gether. “ Oh ! don’t say so, sir,” she exclaimed, with a 
burst of passion, amounting almost to frenzy. “ Oh ! 
don’t say so, sir ! I can’t bear it ! Men have been 
brought to life, before, when unskilful people have given 
them up for lost ; and men hav5 died, who might have 
been restored, if proper means had been resorted to. 
Don’t let him He here, sir, without one effort to save 
him! This very moment life may be passing away. 
Do try, sir, — do, for Heaven’s sake ! ” — And while 
speaking, she hurriedly chafed, first the forehead, and 
then the breast, of the senseless form before her ; and 
then wildly beat the cold hands, which when she ceased 
to hold them, fell listlessly and heavily back on the 
coverlet. 

“ It is of no use, my good woman,” said the surgeon 
soothingly, as he withdrew his hand from the man’s 
breast. ‘‘ Stay — undraw that curtain 1 ” 

“ Why ? ” said the woman, starting up. 

“ Undraw that curtain I ” repeated the surgeon, in an 
ugitated tone. 

“ / darkened the room on purpose,” said the woman, 
throwing herself before him as he rose to undraw it. — 


THE BLACK VEIL. 


175 


“ Oh I sir, have pity on me ! If it can be of no use, and 
he is really dead, do not expose that form to other eyes 
than mine ! ” 

This man died no natural or easy death,” said the 
surgeon. “ I mmt see the body ! ” With a motion so 
sudden, that the woman hardly knew that he had slipped 
from beside her, he tore open the curtain, admitted the 
full light of day, and returned to the bedside. 

“ There has been violence here,” he said, pointing to- 
wards the body, and gazing intently on the face, from 
which the black veil was now, for the first time, removed. 
In the excitement of a minute before, the female had 
thrown off the bonnet and veil, and now stood with her 
eyes fixed upon him. Her features were those of a 
woman of about fifty, who had once been handsome. 
Sorrow and weeping had left traces upon them which not 
time itself would ever have produced without their aid ; 
her face was deadly pale ; and there was a nervous con- 
tortion of the lip, and an unnatural fire in her eye, which 
showed too plainly that her bodily and mental powers 
had nearly sunk’ beneath an accumulation of misery. 

“ There has been violence here,” said the surgeon, pre- 
serving his searching glance. 

“ There has ! ” replied the woman. 

“ This man has been murdered.” 

“ That I call God to witness he has,” said the woman, 
passionately ; “ pitilessly, inhumanly murdered ! ” 

“ By whom ? ” said the surgeon, seizing the woman by 
the arm. 

“ Look at the butchers’ marks, and then ask me ! ” she 
replied. 

The surgeon turned his face towards the bed, and bent 
pver the body which now lay full in the light of the wm- 


i76 


SKETCHES BY B02. 


iow. The throat was swollen, and a livid mark encircled 
it. Tlie truth flashed suddenly upon him. 

“ This is one of tlie men who were hanged this morn- 
ing ! ” he exclaimed, turning away with a shudder. 

“ It is,” replied the woman, with a cold, unmeaning 
stare. 

“ Who was he ? ” inquired the surgeon. 

“ My son^^ rejoined the woman ; and fell senseless at 
his feet. 

It was true. A companion, equally guilty with him- 
self, had been acquitted for want of evidence ; and this 
man had been left for death, and executed. To recount 
the circumstances of the case, at this distant period, must 
be unnecessary, and might give pain to some persons still 
alive. The history was an every-day one. The mother 
was a widow without friends or money, and had denied 
herself necessaries to bestow them on her orphan boy. 
That boy, unmindful of her prayers, and forgetful of the 
sufferings she had endured for him — incessant anxiety 
of mind, and voluntary starvation of body — had plunged 
into a career of dissipation and crime. And this was 
the result : his own death by the hangman’s hands, and 
his mother’s shame, and incurable insanity. 

For many years after this occurrence, and when profit- 
able and arduous avocations would have led many men 
to forget that such a miserable being existed, the young 
iurgeon was a daily visitor at the side of the harmless 
mad woman ; not only soothing her by his presence and 
kindness, but alleviating the rigor of her condition by 
pecuniary donations for her comfort and support, be- 
stowed with no sparing hand. In the transient gleam of 
recollection and consciousness which preceded her death, 
a prayer for his welfare and protection, as fervent as 


THE STEAM EXCURSION. 


177 


moiial ever breathed, rose from the lips of this poor 
friendless creature. The prayer flew to Heaven and was 
heard. The blessings he was instrumental in conferring, 
have been repaid to him a thousand-fold ; but, amid all 
the honors of rank and station which have since been 
heaped upon him, and which he has so well earned, he 
can have no reminiscence more gratifying to his heart 
than that connected with The Black Veil. 


CHAPTER VIL 

THE STEAM EXCURSION. 

Mr. Percy Noakes was a law'-student, inhabiting a 
set of chambers on the fourth floor, in one of those houses 
in Gray’s Inn Square which command an extensive view 
of the gardens, and their usual adjuncts — flaunting 
nursery-maids, and town-made children, with parenthet- 
ical legs. Mr. Percy Noakes was what is generally 
termed — “a devilish good fellow.” He had a large circle 
of acquaintance, and seldom dined at his own expense. 
He used to talk politics to papas, flatter the vanity of 
mammas, do the amiable to their daughters, make pleas- 
ure engagements with their sons, and romp with the 
younger branches. Like those paragons of perfection, 
advertising footmen out of place, he was always “ willing 
to make himself generally useful.” If any old lady, 
whose son was in India, gave a ball, Mr. Percy Noakes 
was master of the ceremonies ; if any young lady made 
4 stolen match, Mr. Percy Noakes gave her away ; if a 

VOL. II. 12 


178 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


juvenile wife presented her husband with a blooming 
cherub, Mr. Percy Noakes w^as either godfather, or 
deputy godfather ; and if any member of a friend’s 
family died, Mr. Percy Noakes was invariably to be seen 
in the second mourning coach, with a white handkerchief 
to his eyes, sobbing — to use his own appropriate and 
expressive description — “ like winkin ! ” 

It may readily be imagined that these numerous avo- 
cations were rather calculated to interfere with Mr. Percy 
Noakes’s professional studies. Mr. Percy Noakes was 
perfectly aware of the fact, and had, therefore, after 
mature reflection, made up his mind not to study at all 
— a*laudable determination, to which he adhered in the 
most praiseworthy manner. His sitting-room presented 
a strange chaos of dress-gloves, boxing-gloves, carica- 
tures, albums, invitation-cards, foils, cricket-bats, card- 
board drawings, paste, gum, and fifty other miscellaneous 
articles, heaped together in the strangest confusion. He 
was always making something for somebody, or planning 
some party of pleasure, Avhich was his great forte. He 
invariably spoke with astonishing rapidity; was smart, 
spoffish, and eight-and-twenty. 

“ Splendid idea, ’pon my life ! ” soliloquized Mr. Percy 
Noakes, over his morning’s coffee, as his mind reverted 
to a suggestion which had been thrown out on the pre- 
vious night, by a lady at whose house he had spent the 
evening. “ Glorious idea ! — Mrs. Stubbs.” 

“ Yes, sir,” replied a dirty old woman with an inflamed 
countenance, emerging from the bedroom, with a batrel 
of dirt and cinders. — This was the laundress. “ Did 
you call, sir ! ” 

“ Oh ! Mrs. Tubbs, I’m going out. If that tailor 
dhould call again, you’d better say — you’d better say 


THE STEAM EXCURSION. 


179 


Pm out of town, and shan’t be back for a fortnight ; and 
if that bootmaker should come, tell him I’ve lost his ad- 
dress, or I’d have sent him that little amount. Mind he 
^writes it down; and if Mr. Hardy should call — you 
know Mr. Hardy?” 

“ The funny gentleman, sir ? ” 

“ Ah ! the funny gentleman. If Mr. Hardy should 
call, say I’ve gone to Mrs. Taunton’s about that water- 
party.” 

“ Yes, sir.” 

“ And if any fellow calls, and says he’s come about a 
steamer, tell him to be here at five o’clock this afternoon, 
Mrs. Stubbs.” 

“ Very well, sir.” 

Mr. Percy Noakes brushed his hat, whisked the 
crumbs off his inexplicables with a silk handkerchief, 
gave the ends of his hair a persuasive roll round his 
forefinger, and sallied forth for Mrs. Taunton’s domicile 
in Great Marlborough Street, where she and her daugh- 
ters occupied the upper part of a house. She was a 
good-looking widow of fifty, with the form of a giantess 
and the mind of a child. The pursuit of pleasure, and 
some meafis of killing time, were the sole end of her 
existence. She doted on her daughters, who were as 
frivolous as herself. 

A general exclamation of satisfaction hailed the arri- 
val of Mr. Percy Noakes, who went threw the ordinary 
salutations, and threw himself into an easy-chair near 
the ladies’ work-table, with the ease of a regularly estab- 
lished friend of the family. Mrs. Taunton was busily 
engaged in planting immense bright bows on every part 
3f a smart cap on which it was possible to stick one ; Miss 
Emily Taunton was making a watchguard ; Miss Sophia 


180 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


was at the piano, practising a new song — poetry by the 
young officer, or the police-officer, or the custom-house 
officer, or some other interesting amateur. 

“ You good creature ! ” said Mrs. Taunton, addressing 
the gallant Percy. “ You really are a good soul ! You’ve 
come about the water-party, I know.” 

“ I should rather suspect I had,” replied Mr. Noakes, 
triumphantly. “ Now come here, girls, and I’ll tell you 
all about it.” Miss Emily and Miss Sophia advanced to 
the table. 

“ Now,” continued Mr. Percy Noakes, “ it seems to me 
that the best way will be, to have a committee of ten, to 
make all the arrangements, and manage the whole set- 
out. Then, I propose that the expenses shall be paid 
by these ten fellows jointly.” 

“ Excellent, indeed ! ” said Mrs. Taunton, who highly 
approved of this part of the arrangements. 

“ Then, my plan is, that each of these ten fellows shall 
have the power of asking five people. There must be a 
meeting of the committee, at my chambers, to make all 
the arrangements, and these people shall be then named ; 
every member of the committee shall have the power of 
black-bidling any one who is proposed ; and* one black 
ball shall exclude that person. This will insure our 
having a pleasant party, you know.” 

“ What a manager you are ! ” interrupted Mrs. 
Taunton again. 

“ Charming ! ” said the lovely Emily. 

“ I never did ! ” ejaculated Sophia. 

“ Yes, I think it’ll do,” replied Mr. Percy Noakes, who 
was now quite in his element. “ I think it'll do. Then 
you know we shall go down to the Nore, and back, and 
have a regular capital cold dinner laid out in the cabin 


THE STEAM EXCURSION. 


181 


before we start, so that everything may be ready without 
any confusion ; and we shall have the lunch laid out, on 
deck, in those little tea-garden-looking concerns by the 
paddle-boxes — I don’t know what you call ’em. Then, 
we shall hire a steamer expressly for our party, and a 
band, and have the deck chalked, and we shall be able to 
dance quadrilles all day ; and then, whoever we know 
that’s musical, you know, why they’ll make themselves 
useful and agreeable ; and — and — upon the whole, I 
really hope we shall have a glorious day, you know ! ” 

The announcement of these arrangements was received 
with the utmost enthusiasm. Mrs. Taunton, Emily, and 
Sophia, were loud in their praises. 

“ Well, but tell me, Percy,” said Mrs. Taunton, “ who 
are the ten gentlemen to be ? ” 

“ Oh ! I know plenty of fellows who’ll be delighted 
with the scheme,” replied Mr. Percy Noakes : “ of 
course we shall have — ” 

“ Mr. Hardy ! ” interrupted the servant, announcing a 
visitor. Miss Sophia and Miss Emily hastily assumed 
the most interesting attitudes that could be adopted on 
so short a notice. 

“ How are you ? ” said a stout gentleman of about 
forty, pausing at the door in the attitude of an awkward 
harlequin. This was Mr. Hardy, whom we have before 
described, on the authority of Mrs. Stubbs, as “ the funny 
gentleman.” He w^as an Astley-Cooperish Joe Miller — 
a practical joker, immensely popular with married ladies, 
and a general favorite with young men. He was always 
engaged in some pleasure excursion or other, and de- 
lighted in getting somebody into a scrape on such occa- 
sions. He could sing comic songs, imitate hackney- 
coachmen and fowls, play airs on his chin, and execute 


182 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


concertos on the Je%vs’-harp. He always ate and drjinb 
most immoderately, and was the bosom-friend of Mr. 
Percy Noakes. He had a red face, a somewhat husky 
voice, and a tremendous laugh. 

“ How are you ? ” said this worthy, laughing, as if it 
were the finest joke in the world to make a morning call, 
and shaking hands with the ladies with as much vehe- 
mence as if their arms had been so many pump-handles. 

“ You’re just the very man I wanted,” said Mr. Percy 
Noakes, who proceeded to explain the cause of his being 
in requisition. 

“ Ha ! ha ! ha ! ” shouted Hardy, after hearing the 
statement, and receiving a detailed account of the pro- 
posed excursion. “ Oh, capital ! glorious ! What a day 
it will be ! what fun ! — But, I say, when are you going 
to begin making the arrangements ? ” 

“ No time like the present — at once, if you please.” 

“ Oh, charming ! ” cried the ladies. “ Pray, do ! ” 

Writing materials were laid before Mr. Percy Noakes, 
and the names of the different members of the committee 
were agreed on, after as much discussion between him 
and Mr. Hardy as if the fate of nations had depended 
on their appointment. It was then agreed that a meet- 
ing should take place at Mr. Percy Noakes’s chambers 
on the ensuing Wednesday evening at eight o’clock, and 
the visitors departed. 

Wednesday evening arrived ; eight o’clock came, and 
eight members of the committee were punctual in their 
attendance. Mr. Loggins, the solicitor, of Boswell 
Court, sent an excuse, and Mr. Samuel Briggs, the ditto 
of Furaival’s Inn, sent his brother: much to his (the 
brother’s) satisfaction, and greatly to the discomfiture of 
Mr. Percy Noakes. Between the Briggses and the 


THE STEAM EXCURSION. 


183 


Tauntons there existed a degree of implacable hatred, 
quite unprecedented. The animosity between the Mon- 
tagues and Capulets, was nothing to that which prevailed 
between these two illustrious houses. Mrs. Briggs was a 
widow, with three daughters and two sons ; Mr. Samuel, 
the eldest, was an attorney, and Mr. Alexander, the 
youngest, was under articles to his brother. They re- 
sided in Portland Street, Oxford Street, and moved in 
the same orbit as the Tauntons — hence their mutual 
dislike. If the Miss Briggses appeared in smart bonnets, 
the Miss Tauntons eclipsed them with smarter. If Mrs. 
Taunton appeared in a cap of all the hues of the rain- 
bow, Mrs. Briggs forthwith mounted a toque, with all the 
patterns of the kaleidoscope. If Miss Sophia Taunton 
learnt a new song, two of the Miss Briggses came out 
with a new duet. The Tauntons had once gained a tem- 
porary triumph with the assistance of a harp, but the 
Briggses brought three guitars into the field, and effec- 
tually routed the enemy. There was no end to the riv- 
alry between them. 

Now, as Mr. Samuel Briggs was a mere machine, a 
sort of self-acting legal walking-stick ; and as the party 
was known to have originated, however remotely, with 
Mrs. Taunton, the female branches of the Briggs family 
had arranged that Mr. Alexander should attend, instead 
of his brother; and as the said Mr. Alexander was de- 
servedly celebrated for possessing all the pertinacity of 
a bankruptcy-court attorney, combined with the obstinacy 
of that useful animal which browses on the thistle, he re- 
quired but little tuition. He was especially enjoined to 
make himself as disagreeable as possible ; and above all, 
to black-ball the Tauntons at every liazard. 

The proceedings of the evening w^ere opened by Mr. 


184 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


Percy Noakes. After successfully urging on the gentle- 
men present the propriety of their mixing some brandy- 
and-water, he briefly stated the object of the meeting 
and concluded by observing that the first step must be 
the selection of a chairman, necessarily possessing som^^ 
arbitrary — he trusted not unconstitutional — powers, to 
whom the personal direction of the whole of the arrange- 
ments (subject to the approval of the committee) should 
be confided. A pale young gentleman, in a green stock 
and spectacles of the same, a member of the honorable 
society of the Inner Temple, immediately rose for the 
purpose of proposing Mr. Percy Noakes. He had known ^ 
him long, and this he would say, that a more honorable, 
a more excellent, or a better-hearted fellow, never ex- 
isted. — (Hear, hear !) The young gentleman, who was 
a member of a debating society, took this opportunity of 
entering into an examination of the state of the English 
law, from the days of William the Conqueror down to 
the present period ; he briefly adverted to the code es- 
tablished by the ancient Druids ; slightly glanced at the 
principles laid down by the Athenian lawgivers ; and 
concluded with a most glowing eulogium on picnics and 
constitutional rights. 

Mr. Alexander Briggs opposed the motion. He had 
the highest esteem for Mr. Percy Noakes as an individ- 
ual, but he did consider that he ought not to be intrusted 
with these immense powers — (oh, oh!) — He believed 
that in the proposed capacity Mr. Percy Noakes would 
not act fairly, impartially, or honorably ; but he begged 
/t to be distinctly understood, that he said this without 
the slightest personal disrespect. Mr. Hardy defended 
his honorable friend, in a voice rendered partially unin- 
telligible by emotion and brandy-and-water. The prop- 


THE STEAM EXCURSION. 


185 


osition was put to the vote, and there appearing to be only 
one dissentient voice, Mr. Percy Noakes was declared 
duly elected, and took the chair accordingly. 

The business of the meeting now proceeded with 
rapidity. The chairman delivered in his estimate of the 
probable expense of the excursion, and every one present 
subscribed his proportion thereof. The question was 
put that “ The Endeavor ” be hired for the occasion ; 
Mr. Alexander Briggs moved as an amendment, that the 
word “ Fly ” be substituted for the word “ Endeavor ; ” 
but after some debate consented to withdraw his opposi- 
tion. The important ceremony of balloting then com- 
menced. A tea-caddy was placed on a table in a dark 
corner of the apartment, and every one was provided 
with two backgammon men, one black and one white. 

The chairman with great solemnity then read the fol- 
lowing list of the guests whom he proposed to introduce : 
— Mrs. Taunton and two daughters, Mr. Wizzle, Mr 
Simson. The names were respectively balloted for, and 
Mrs. Taunton and her daughters were declared to be 
black-balled. Mr. Percy Noakes and Mr. Hardy ex- 
changed glances. 

“ Is your list prepared, Mr. Briggs ? ” inquired the 
chairman. 

“ It is,” replied Alexander, delivering in the follow- 
ing: “Mrs. Briggs and three daughters, Mr. Samuel 
Briggs.” The previous ceremony was repeated, and 
Mrs. Briggs and three daughters were declared to be 
black balled. Mr. Alexander Briggs looked rather fool- 
ish, and the remainder of the company appeared some- 
what overawed by the mysterious nature of the proceed 
ngs. 

The balloting proceeded ; but, one little circumstance 


186 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


which Mr. Percy Noakes had not originally foreseen, 
prevented the system from working quite as well as he 
had anticipated. Everybody was black-balled. Mr, 
Alexander Briggs, by way of retaliation, exercised liis 
power of exclusion in every instance, and the result was, 
that after three hours had been consumed in hard bal- 
loting, the names of only three gentlemen were found to 
have been agreed to. In this dilemma what was to be 
done ? either the whole plan must fall to the ground, or 
a compromise must be effected. The latter alternative 
was preferable ; and Mr. Percy Noakes therefore pro- 
posed that the form of balloting should be dispensed 
with, and that every gentleman should merely be re- 
quired to state whom he intended to bring. The pro-- 
posal was acceded to; the Tauntons and the Briggses 
were reinstated ; and the party was foi-med. 

The next Wednesday was fixed for the eventful day, 
and it was unanimously resolved that every member of 
the committee should wear a piece of blue sarsenet 
ribbon round his left arm. It appeared from the state- 
ment of Mr. Percy Noakes, that the boat belonged to 
the General Steam Navigation Company, and was then 
lying off the Custom House ; and, as he proposed that 
the dinner and wines should be provided by an eminent 
city purveyor, it was arranged that Mr. Percy Noakes 
should be on board by seven o’clock to superintend the 
arrangements, and that the remaining members of the 
committee, together with the company generally, should 
be expected to join her by nine o’clock. More brandy- 
and-water was despatched ; several speeches were made 
by the different law students present ; thanks were voted 
to the chairman ; and the meeting separated. 

The weather had been beautiful up to this period, and 


THE STEAM EXCURSION. 


187 


beautiful it continued to be. Sunday passed over, and 
Mr. Percy Noakes became unusually fidgety — rushing, 
constantly, to and from the Steam Packet Wharf, to the 
astonishment of the clerks, and the great emolument of 
the Holborn cabmen. Tuesday arrived, and the anxiety 
of Mr. Percy Noakes knew no bounds. He was every 
instant running to the window, to look out for clouds ; 
and Mr. Hardy astonished the whole square by practis- 
ing a new comic song for the occasion, in the chairman’s 
chambers. 

Uneasy were the slumbers of Mr. Percy Noakes that 
night ; he tossed and tumbled about, and had confused 
dreams of steamers starting off, and gigantic clocks with 
the hands pointing to a quarter past nine, and the ugly 
face of Mr. Alexander Briggs looking over the boat’s 
side, and grinning, as if in derision of his fruitless at- 
tempts to move. He made a violent effort to get on 
board, and awoke. The bright sun was shining cheer- 
fully into the bedroom, and Mr. Percy Noakes started up 
for his watch, in the dreadful expectation of finding his 
worst dreams realized. 

It was just five o’clock. He calculated the time — he 
should be a good half-hour dressing himself ; and as it 
was a lovely morning, and the tide would be then run- 
ning down, he would walk leisurely to Strand Lane, and 
have a boat to the Custom House. 

He dressed himself, took a hasty apology for a break- 
fast, and sallied forth. The streets looked as lonely and 
deserted as if they had been crowded, overnight, for the 
last time. Here and there, an early apprentice, with 
quenched-looking sleepy eyes, was taking down the shut- 
ters of a shop ; and a policeman or milk-woman might 
occasionally be seen pacing slowly along ; but the ser 


188 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


vants had not yet begun to clean the doors, or light the 
kitchen fires, and London looked the picture of desola- 
tion. At the corner of a by-street, near Temple Bar 
was stationed a “ street-breakfast.” The coffee was 
boiling over a charcoal fire, and large slices of bread and 
butter were piled one upon the other, like deals in a 
timber-yard. The company were seated on a form, 
which, with a view both to security and comfort, was 
placed against a neighboring wall. Two young men, 
whose uproarious mirth and disordered dress bespoke 
the conviviality of the preceding evening, were treating 
three “ ladies ” and an Irish laborer. A little sweep was 
standing at a short distance, casting a longing eye at the 
tempting delicacies ; and a policeman was watching the 
group from the opposite side of the street. The wan 
looks and gaudy finery of the thinly-clad women con- 
trasted as strangely with the gay sunlight as did their 
forced merriment with the boisterous hilarity of the two 
young men, who, now and then, varied their amusements 
by “ bonneting ” the proprietor of this itinerant coffee- 
house. 

Mr. Percy Noakes walked briskly by, and when he 
turned down Strand Lane, and caught a glimpse of the 
glistening water, he thought he had never felt so impor- 
tant or so happy in his life. 

“ Boat, sir ! ” cried one of the three watermen who 
were mopping out their boats, and all whistling. “ Boat, 
irl” 

“ No,” replied Mr. Percy Noakes, rather sharply ; for 
the inquiry was not made in a manner at all suitable to 
Ids dignity. 

“ Would you prefer a wessel, sir ? ” inquired another, 
o the infinite delight of the “ Jack-in-the-water.” 


THE STEAM EXCURSION. 189 

Mr. Percy Noakes replied with a look of supreme 
contempt. 

“ Did you want to be put on board a steamer, sir ? ” 
inquired an old fireman-waterman, very confidentially. 
He was dressed in a faded red suit, just the color of the 
;over of a very old Court- Guide. 

“ Yes, make haste — the Endeavor — off the Custom 
House.” 

“ Endeavor ! ” cried the man who had convulsed the 
“ Jack ” before. “ Vy, 1 see the Endeavor go up half an 
hour ago.” 

“ So did I,” said another ; “ and I should think she’d 
gone down by this time, for she’s a precious sight too full 
of ladies and gen’lemen.” 

Mr. Percy Noakes affected to disregard these represen- 
tations, and stepped into the boat, which the old man, by 
dint of scrambling, and shoving, and grating, had brought 
up to the causeway. “ Shove her off ! ” cried Mr. Percy 
Noakes, and away the boat glided down the river ; Mr. 
Percy Noakes seated on the recently mopped seat, and 
the watermen at the stairs offering to bet any reasonable 
sum that he’d never reach the “ Custum-us.” 

“ Here she is, by Jove ! ” said the delighted Percy, as 
they ran alongside the Endeavor. 

“ Hold hard ! ” cried the steward over the side, and 
Mr. Percy Noakes jumped on board. 

“ Hope you will find everything as you wished, sir 
She looks uncommon well this morning.” 

“ She does, indeed,” replied the manager, in a state of 
ecstasy which it is impossible to describe. The deck 
was scrubbed, and the seats were scrubbed, and there 
- was a bench for the band, and a place for dancing, and a 
pile of camp-stools, and an awning ; and then Mr. Percy 


190 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


Noakes bustled down below, and there were the pastry* 
cook’s men, and the steward’s wife, laying out the dinner 
on two tables the whole length of the cabin ; and then, 
Mr. Percy Noakes took off his coat, and rushed back- 
wards and forwards, doing nothing, but quite convinced 
he was assisting everybody ; and the steward’s wife 
laughed till she cried, and Mr. Percy Noakes panted 
with the violence of his exertions. And then, the bell 
at London Bridge Wharf rang ; and a Margate boat was 
just starting ; and a Gravesend boat was just starting, 
and people shouted, and porters ran down the steps with 
luggage that would crush any men but porters; and 
sloping boards, with bits of wood nailed on them were 
placed between the outside boat and the inside boat ; and 
the passengers ran along them, and looked like so many 
fowls coming out of an area ; and then the bell ceased, 
and the boards were taken away, and the boats started, 
and the whole scene was one of the most delightful bus- 
tle and confusion. 

The time wore on ; half-past eight o’clock arrived : the 
pastrycook’s men went ashore ; the dinner was com- 
pletely laid out ; and Mr. Percy Noakes locked the prin- 
cipal cabin, and put the key in his pocket, in order that 
it might be suddenly disclosed, in all its magnificence, to 
the eyes of the astonished company. The band came on 
board and so did the wine. 

Ten minutes to nine, and the committee embarked in 
a body. There was Mr. Hardy, in a blue jacket and 
waistcoat, white trousers, silk stockings, and pumps — in 
full aquatic costume, with a straw hat on his head, and 
an immense telescope under his arm ; and there was the 
young gentleman with the green spectacles, with nan- - 
keen inexplicables, with a ditto waistcoat and bright but- 


THE STEAM EXCUESION. 


191 


tons, like the pictures of Paul — not the saint, but he of 
Virginia notoriety. The remainder of the committee, 
dressed in white hats, light jackets, waistcoats, and 
trousers, looked something between waiters and West 
India planters. 

Nine o’clock struck, and the company arrived in 
shoals. Mr. Samuel Briggs, Mrs. Briggs, and the 
Misses Briggs, made their appearance in a smart private 
wlierry. The three guitars, in their respective dark 
green cases, were carefully stowed away in the bottom 
of the boat, accompanied by two immense portfolios of 
music, which it would take at least a week’s incessant 
playing to get through. The Tauntons arrived at the 
same moment with more music, and a lion — a gentle- 
man with a bass voice and an incipient red moustache. 
The colors of the Taunton party were pink ; those of 
the Briggses a light blue. The Tauntons had artificial 
flowers in their bonnets ; here the Briggses gained a 
decided advantage — they wore feathers. 

“ How d’ye do, dear ” said the Misses Briggs to the 
Misses Taunton. (The wmrd “ dear ” among girls is fre- 
quently synonymous with “ wretch.”) 

Quite well, thank you, dear,” replied the Misses 
Taunton to the Misses Briggs ; and then there was 
such a kissing, and congratulating, and shaking of hands, 
as might have induced one to suppose that tlie two fam- 
ilies were the best friends in the world, instead of each 
a isliing the other overboard, as they most sincerely did. 

Mr. Percy Noakes received the visitors, and bowed to 
the strange gentleman, as if he should like to know who 
lie was. This was just what Mrs. Taunton wanted. 
Here was an opportunity to astonish the Briggses. 

“ Oh ! I beg your pardon,” said the general of the 


192 


SKETCHES BY B02. 


Taunton party, with a careless air. — “ Captain Helves 
— Mr. Percy Noakes — Mrs. Briggs — Captain Helves.” 

Mr. Percy Noakes bowed very low ; the gallant cap- 
tain did the same with all due ferocity, and the Briggses 
were clearly overcome. 

“ Our friend, Mr. Wizzle, being unfortunately pre- 
vented from coming,” resumed Mrs. Taunton, “ I did my- 
self the pleasure of bringing the captain, whose musical 
talents I knew would be a great acquisition.” 

“ In the name of the committee I have to thank you 
for doing so, and to offer you welcome, sir,” replied 
Percy. (Here the scraping was renewed.) “ But pray 
be seated — won’t you walk aft ? Captain, will you 
conduct Miss Taunton ? — Miss Briggs, will you allow 
me ? ” 

“ Where could they have picked up that military 
man ? ” inquired Mrs. Briggs of Miss Kate Briggs, as 
they followed the little party. 

“ I can’t imagine, replied Miss Kate, bursting with 
vexation ; for the very fierce air with which the gallant 
captain regarded the company had impressed her with a 
high sense of his importance. 

Boat after boat came alongside, and guest after guest 
arrived. The invites had been excellently arranged : 
Mr. Percy Noakes having considered it as important that 
the number of young men sliould exactly tally with that 
of the young ladies, as that the quantity of knives on 
\oard should be in precise proportion to the forks. 

“ Now^ is every one on board?” inquired IMr. Percy 
Noakes. The committee (who, with tlieir bits of blue 
ribbon, looked as if they were all going to be bled) bus- 
tled about to ascertain the fact, and reported that tlicy 
might safely start. 


THE STEAM EXCURSION. 


193 

“ Go on ! ” cried the master of the boat from the top 
of one of the paddle-boxes. 

“ Go on ! ’’ echoed the boy, who was stationed over the 
hatchway to pass the directions down to the engineer ; 
and away went the vessel with that agreeable noise 
which is peculiar to steamers, and which is composed 
of a mixture of creaking, gushing, clanging, and snort- 
ing. 

“ Hoi — oi — oi — oi — oi — oi — o — i — i — i ! ” shouted half 
a dozen voices from a boat, a quarter of a rnile astern. 

“ Ease her ! ” cried the captain : “ do these people be- 
long to us, sir ? ” 

“ Noakes,” exclaimed Hardy, who had been looking at 
every object, far and near, through the large telescope, 
“ it’s the- Fleetwoods and the Wakefields — and two 
children with them, by Jove ! ” 

“ What a shame to bring children ! ” said everybody ; 
“ how very inconsiderate ! ” 

“ I say, it would be a good joke to pretend not to see 
’em, wouldn’t it ? ” suggested Hardy, to the immense de- 
light of the company generally. A council of war was 
hastily held, and it was resolved that the new comers 
should be taken on board, on Mr. Hardy’s solemnly 
pledging himself to tease the children during the whole 
of the day. 

“ Stop her ! ” cried the captain. 

“ Stop her ! ”* repeated the boy ; whizz went the steam, 
and all the young ladies, as in duty bound, screamed in 
concert. They were only appeased by the assurance of 
the martial Helves, that the escape of steam consequent 
on stopping a vessel was seldom attended with any great 
loss of human life. 

Two men ran to the side; and after some shouting, 
13 


VOL. II. 


194 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


and swearing, and angling for the wherry with a boat- 
hook, INIr. Fleetwood, and Mrs. Fleetwood, and Master 
Fleetwood, and Mr. Wakefield, and Mrs. Wakefield, and 
Miss Wakefield, were safely deposited on the deck. The 
girl was about six years old, the boy about four ; the 
former was dressed in a white frock with a- pink sash 
and dog’s-eared-looking little spencer: a straw bonnet 
and green veil, six inches by tliree and a half ; the latter 
was attired for the occasion in a nankeen frock, between 
the bottom of which, and the top of his plaid socks, a 
considerable portion of two small mottled legs was dis- 
cernible. He had a light blue cap with a gold band and 
tassel on his head, and a damp piece of gingerbread in 
his hand, with which he had slightly embossed his coun- 
tenance. 

The boat once more started off ; the band played “ Off 
she goes ; ” the major part of the company conversed 
cheerfully in groups ; and the old gentlemen walked up 
and down the deck in pairs, as perseveringly and gravely 
as if they were doing a match against time for an im- 
mense stake. They ran briskly down the Pool ; the 
gentlemen pointed out tlie Docks, the Thames Police 
Office, and other elegant public edifices ; and the young 
ladies exhibited a proper display of horror at the appear- 
ance of the coal-whippers and ballast-heavers. Mr. 
Hardy told stories to the married ladies, at which they 
laughed very much in their pocket-handkerchiefs, and 
hit him on the knuckles with their fans, declaring him to 
be “ a naughty man — a shocking creature ” — and so 
forth ; and Captain Helves gave slight descriptions of 
battles, and duels, with a most bloodthirsty air, which 
made him the admiration of the women, and the envy 
of the men. Quadrilling commenced ; Captain Helves 


THE STEAM EXCURSION. 


195 


danced one set with Miss Emily Taunton, and another 
set with Miss Sophia Taunton. Mrs. Taunton was in 
ecstasies. The victory appeared to be complete; but 
alas ! the inconstancy of man ! Having performed this 
necessary duty, he attached himself solely to Miss Julia 
Briggs, with whom he danced no less than three sets 
consecutively, and from whose side he evinced no inten- 
tion of stirring for the remainder of the day. 

Mr. Hardy, having played one or two very brilliant 
fantasias on the Jews’-harp, and having frequently re- 
peated the exquisitely amusing joke of slyly chalking a 
large cross on the back of some member of the com- 
mittee, Mr. Percy Noakes expressed his hope that some 
of their musical friends would oblige the company by a 
display of their abilities. 

“ Perhaps,” he said in a very insinuating manner, 
“ Captain Helves will oblige us ? ” Mrs. Taunton’s 
countenance lighted up, for the captain only sang duets, 
and couldn’t sing them with anybody but one of her 
daughter. 

“ Keally,” said that warlike individual, “ I should be 
very happy, but — ” 

“ Oh ! pray do,” cried all the young ladies. 

“ Miss Sophia, have you any objection to join in a 
duet ? ” 

“ Oh ! not the slightest ; ” returned the young lady, in 
a tone which clearly showed she had the greatest possible 
objection. 

“ Shall I accompany you, dear ? ” inquired one of the 
Miss Briggses, with the bland intention of spoiling the 
effect. 

“ Very much obliged to you. Miss Briggs, sharply 
retorted Mrs. Taunton, who saw through the manoeu 


196 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


rre ; “ my daughters always sing without accompani- 
ments.” 

“ And without voices,” tittered Mrs. Briggs, in a low 
tone. 

“ Perhaps,” said Mrs. Taunton, reddening, for she 
guessed the tenor of the observation, though she had not 
heard it clearly — “ Perhaps it would be as well for some 
people, if their voices were not quite so audible as they 
are to other people.” 

“ And, perhaps, if gentlemen who are kidnapped to 
pay attention to some persons’ daughters, had not suffi- 
cient discernment to pay attention to other persons’ 
daughters,” returned Mrs. Briggs, “ some persons would 
not be so ready to display that ill-temper which, thank 
God, distinguishes them from other persons.” 

“ Persons ! ” ejaculated Mrs. Taunton. 

“ Persons,” replied Mrs. Briggs. 

“ Insolence ! ” 

Creature ! ” 

“ Hush ! hush ! ” interrupted Mr. Percy Noakes, who 
was one of the very few by whom this dialogue had been 
overheard. “ Hush ! — pray, silence for the duet.” 

After a great deal of preparatory crowing and hum- 
ming, the captain began the following duet from the 
opera of “ Paul and Virginia,” in that grunting tone in 
which a man gets down. Heaven knows where, without 
the remotest chance of ever getting up again. This, in 
private circles, is frequently designated “ a bass voice.” 

“ See (sung the captain) from o — ce— an ri — sing 
Bright flames the or — b of d — ay. 

From yon gro — ove, the varied so — ongs — ” 

Here, the singer was interrupted by varied cries of 
the most dreadful description, proceeding from some 


THE STEAM EXCURSION. 


197 


grove ill the immediate vicinity of the starboard paddle- 
box. 

“ My child ! ” screamed Mrs. Fleetwood. ‘‘ My child ! 
it is his voice — I know it.” 

Mr. Fleetwood, accompanied by several gentlemen, 
here rushed to the* quarter from whence the noise pro- 
ceeded, and an exclamation of horror burst from the 
company ; the general impression being, that the little 
innocent had either got his head in the water, or his legs 
in the machinery. 

“ What is the matter ? ” shouted the agonized father, 
as he returned with the child in his arms. 

“ Oh ! oh ! oh ! ” screamed the small sufferer again. 

“ What is the matter, dear ? ” inquired the father, once 
more — hastily stripping off the nankeen frock, for the 
purpose of ascertaining whether the child had one bone 
which was not smashed to pieces. 

“ Oh ! oh ! — Fm so frightened ! ” 

“ What at, dear ? — what at ? ” said the mother, sooth- 
ing the sweet infant. 

“ Oh ! he’s been making such dreadful faces at me,” 
cried the boy, relapsing into convulsions at the bare 
recollection. 

“ He ! — who ? ” cried everybody, crowding round 
him. 

“ Oh ! — him ! ” replied the child, pointing at Hardy, 
who affected to be the most concerned of the whole 
group. 

The real state of the case at once flashed upon the 
minds of all present, with the exception of the Fleet- 
Amods and the Wakefields. The facetious Hardy, in ful- 
filment of his promise, had watched the child to a remote 
part of the vessel, and, suddenly appearing before him 


198 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


with the most awful contortions of visage, had produced 
his paroxysm of terror. Of course, he now observed 
that it was hardly necessary for him to deny the accusa- 
tion ; and the unfortunate little victim M^as accordingly 
led below, after receiving sundry thumps on the head 
from both his parents, for having the wickedness to tell 
a story. 

This little interruption having been adjusted, the ciip- 
tain resumed, and Miss Emily chimed in, in due course. 
The duet was loudly applauded, and, certainly, 4he per- 
fect independence of the parties deserved great commen- 
dation. Miss Emily sung her part, without the slightest 
reference to the captain ; and the captain sang so loud, 
that he had not the slightest idea what was being done 
by his partner. After having gone through the last 
few eighteen or nineteen bars by himself, therefore, he 
acknowledged the plaudits of the circle with that air of 
self-denial which men usually assume when they think 
they have done something to astonish the company. 

Now,” said Mr. Percy Noakes, who had just as- 
cended from the fore-cabin, where lie had been busily 
engaged in decanting the wine, “if the Misses Briggs 
will oblige us with something before dinner, I am sure 
we shall be very much delighted.” 

One of those hums of admiration followed the sugges- 
tion, which one frequently hears in society, when nobody 
iias the most distant notion what he is expressing his ap- 
proval of. The three Misses Briggs looked modestly at 
their mamma, and the mamma looked approvingly at 
\ier daughters, and Mrs. Taunton looked scornfully at all 
af them. The Misses Briggs asked for their guitars, 
and several gentlemen seriously damaged the cases in 
their anxiety to present them. Then, there w^as a very 


THE STEAM EXCURSION. 


199 


interesting production of three little kgys for the afore- 
said cases, and* a melodramatic expression of horror at 
finding a string broken ; and a vast deal of screwing and 
tightening, and winding, and tuning, during which Mrs. 
Briggs expatiated to those near her on the immense diffi- 
culty of playing a guitar, and hinted at the wondrou i 
proficiency of her daughters in that mystic art. Mrs 
Taunton whispered to a neighbor that it was “ quite 
sickening ! ” and the Misses Taunton looked as if they 
knew how to play, but disdained to do it. 

At length, the Misses Briggs began in real earnest. 
It was a new Spanish composition, for three voices and 
three guitars. The effect was electrical. All eyes were 
turned upon the captain, who was reported to have once 
passed through Spain with his regiment, and who must 
be well acquainted with the national music. He was in 
raptures. This was sufficient ; the trio was encored ; 
the applause was universal; and never had the Taun- 
tons suffered such a complete defeat. - 

“ Bravo ! bravo ! ” ejaculated the captain ; — “ Bravo ! ” 
Pretty ! isn’t it, sir ? ” inquired Mr. Samuel Briggs, 
with the air of a self-satisfied showman. By the by, 
these were the first words he had been heard to utter 
since he left Boswell Court the evening before. 

“ De — lightful ! ” returned the captain, with a flourish, 
and a military cough ; — “ de — lightful ! ” 

“ Sweet instrument ? ” said an old gentleman with a 
bald head, who had been trying’ all the morning to look 
Mirough a telescope, inside the glass of which Mr. Hardy 
had fixed a large black wafer. 

“ Did you ever hear a Portuguese tambourine ? ” in- 
quired that jocular individual. 

“ Did you ever hear a tom-tom, sir ? ” sternly inquired 


200 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


the captain, who lost no opportunity of showing off hi® 
travels, real or pretended. 

“ A what ? ” asked Hardy, rather taken aback. 

“ A tom-tom.” 

“ Never ! ” 

“ Nor a gum-gum ? ” 

“ Never ! ” 

“ What is a gum-gum ? ” eagerly inquired several 
young ladies. 

“ When I was in the East Indies,” replied the captain. 
(Here was a discovery — he had been in the East In- 
dies !) — “ when I was in the East Indies, I was once 
stopping, a few thousand miles up the country, on a visit 
at the house of a very particular friend of mine. Ram 
Chowdar Doss Azuph A1 Bowlar — a devilish pleasant 
fellow. As we W'ere enjoying our hookahs, one evening, 
in the cool verandah in front of his villa, we were rather 
surprised by the sudden appearance of thirty-four of his 
Kit-ma-gars (for he had rather a large establishment 
there), accompanied by an equal number of Con-su-mars, 
approaching the house with a threatening aspect, and 
beating a tom-tom. The Ram started up — ” 

“ Who ? ” inquired the bald gentleman, intensely in- 
terested. 

“ The Ram — Ram Chowdar — ” 

“ Oh ! ” said the old gentleman, “ I beg your pardon ; 
pray go on.” 

“ — Started up and drew a pistol. ‘ Helves,’ said he, 
‘ my boy,’ — he always called me, my boy — ‘ Helves,’ 
said he, ‘ do you hear that tom-tom ? ’ ‘I do,’ said I. 
His countenance, which before was pale, assumed a most 
frightful appearance ; his whole visage was distorted, and 
bis frame shaken by violent emotions. ‘ Do you see that 


THE STEAM EXCURSION. 


201 


gum-gum?’ said he. ‘No/ said I, staring about me. 
‘ You don’t ? ’ said lie. ‘ No, I’ll be damned if I do/ 
said I ; ‘ and what’s more, I don’t know what a gum- 
gum is,’ said I. I really thought the Ram would have 
dropped. He drew me aside, and with an expression 
of agony I shall never forget, said in a low whisper — ” 

“ Dinner’s on the table, ladies,” interrupted the stew- 
ard’s wife. 

“ Will you allow me ? ” said the captain, immediately 
suiting the action to the word, and escorting Miss Julia 
Briggs to the cabin, with as much ease as if he had 
finished the story. 

“ What an extraordinary circumstance ! ” ejaculated 
the same old gentleman, preserving his listening atti- 
tude. 

“ What a traveller ! ” said the young ladies. 

“ What a singular name ! ” exclaimed the gentlemen, 
rather confused by the coolness of the whole affair. 

“ I wdsh he had finished the story,” said an old lady. 
“ I wonder what a gum-gum really is ? ” 

“ By Jove ! ” exclaimed Hardy, who until now had 
been lost in utter amazement, “ I don’t know what it may 
be in India, but in England I think a gum-gum has very 
much the same meaning as a hum-bug.” 

“ How illiberal ; how envious ! ” cried everybody, as 
they made for the cabin, fully impressed with a belief in 
the captain’s amazing adventures. Helves was the sole 
lion for the remainder of the day — impudence and the 
marvellous are pretty sure passports to any society. 

The party had by this time reached their destination, 
and put about on their return home. The wind, which had 
been with them the whole day, was now directly in their 
leeth ; the weather had become gradually more and more 


202 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


overcast ; and the sky, water, and shore, were all of that 
dull, heavy, uniform lead-color, which house-painters 
daub in the first instance over a street-door which is 
gradually approaching a state of convalescence. It had 
been “ spitting ” with rain for the last half-hour, and 
now began to pour in good earnest. The wind was 
freshening very fast, and the waterman at the wheel had 
unequivocally expressed his opinion that there would x 
shortly be a squall. A slight emotion on the part of the 
vessel, now and then, seemed to suggest the possibility of 
its pitching to a very uncomfortable extent in the event 
of its blowing harder ; and every timber began to creak, 
as if the boat were an over-laden clothes-basket. Sea- 
sickness, however, is like a belief in ghosts — every one 
entertains some misgivings on the subject, but few will 
acknowledge any. The majority of the company, there- 
fore, endeavored to look peculiarly happy, feeling all the 
while especially miserable. 

“ Don’t it rain ? ” inquired the old gentleman before 
noticed, when, by dipjt of squeezing and jamming, they 
were all seated at table. 

“ I think it does — a little,” replied Mr. Percy Noakes, 
who could hardly hear himself speak, in consequence of 
the pattering on the deck. 

“ Don’t it blow ? ” inquired some one else. 

'“No — I don’t think it does,” responded Hardy, sin- 
cerely wishing that he could persuade himself that it did 
not : for he sat near the door, and was almost blown off 
his seat. 

“It’ll soon clear up,” said Mr. Percy Noakes, in a 
cheerful tone. 

“ Oh, certainly ! ” ejaculated the comniittee generally. 

“ No doubt of it ! ” said the remainder of the com- 


THE STEAM EXCURSION. 


208 


pany, whose attention was now pretty well engrossed by 
the serious business of eating, carving, taking wine, and 
so forth. 

The throbbing motion of the engine was but too per- 
ceptible. There was a large, substantial, cold boiled leg 
of mutton, at the bottom of the table shaking like blanc- 
mange ; a previously hearty sirloin of beef looked as if 
it had been suddenly seized with the palsy ; and some 
tongues, which were placed on dishes rather too large 
for them, went through the most surprising evolutions ; 
darting from side to side, and from end to end, like a fly 
in an inverted wine-glass. Then, the sweets shook and 
trembled, till it was quite impossible to help them, and 
people gave up the attempt in despair ; and the pigeon- 
pies looked as if the birds, whose legs were stuck out- 
side, were trying to get them in. The table vibrated and 
started like a feverish pulse, and the very legs were con- 
vulsed — everything was shaking and jarring. The 
beams in the roof of the cabin seemed as if they were 
put there for the sole purpose of giving people headaches, 
and several elderly gentlemen became ill-tempered in 
consequence. As fast as the steward put the fire-irons 
up, they would fall down again ; and the more the ladies 
and gentlemen tried to sit comfortably on their seats, the 
more the seats seemed to slide away from the ladies and 
gentlemen. Several ominous demands were made for 
small glasses of brandy ; the countenances of the com- 
pany gradually underwent most extraordinary changes ; 
one gentleman was observed suddenly to rush from table 
without the slightest ostensible reason, and dart up the 
steps with incredible swiftness : thereby greatly damag- 
ing both himself and the steward, who happened to be 
'joming down at the same moment. 


204 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


The cloth was removed ; the dessert was laid on the 
table ; and the glasses were filled. The motion of the 
boat increased ; several members of the party began to 
feel rather vague and misty, and looked as if they had 
only just got up. The young gentleman with the spec- 
tacles, who had been in a fluctuating state for some time 

— at one moment bright, and at another dismal, like a 
revolving light on the sea-coast — rashly announced his 
wish to propose a toast. After several ineffectual 
attempts to preserve his perpendicular, the young gen- 
tleman, having managed to hook himself to the centre 
leg of the table with his left hand, proceeded as fol- 
lows : 

“ Ladies and gentlemen. A gentleman is among us 

— I may say a stranger — (here some painful thought 
seemed to strike the orator ; he paused, and looked ex- 
tremely odd) whose talents, whose travels, whose cheer- 
fulness — ” 

“ I beg your pardon, Edkins,” hastily interrupted Mr. 
Percy Noakes. — “ Hardy, what’s the matter ? ” 

“ Nothing,” replied the “ funny gentleman,” who had 
just life enough left to utter two consecutive syllables. 

“ Will you have some brandy ? ” 

“ No ! ” replied Hardy in a tone of great indignation, 
and looking as comfortable as Temple Bar in a Scotch 
mist ; “ what should I want brandy for ? ” 

“ Will you go on deck ? ” 

“ No, I will This was said with a most deter- 

mined air, and in a voice which might have been taken 
for an imitation of anything ; it was quite as much like 
a guinea-pig as a bassoon. 

“ I beg your pardon, Edkins,” said the courteous 
Percy ; “ I thought our friend was ill. Pray go on.” 


THE STEAM EXCURSION. 


205 


A pause. 

“ Pray go on.” 

Mr. Edkins is gone,” cried somebody. 

“ I beg your pardon, sir,” said the steward, running up 
.0 Mr. Percy Noakes, “ I beg your pardon, sir, but the 
gentleman as just went on deck — him with the green 
spectacles — is uncommon bad, to be sure ; and the 
young man as played the wiolin says, that unless he has 
some brandy he can’t answer for the consequences. He 
says he has a wife and two children, whose werry sub- 
sistence depends on his breaking a wessel, and he 
expects to do so every moment. The flageolet’s been 
werry ill, but he’s better, only he’s in a dreadful pruspera- 
tion.” 

All disguise was now useless ; the company staggered 
on deck ; the gentlemen tried to see nothing but the 
clouds ; and the ladies, muffled up in such shawls and 
cloaks as they had brought with them, lay about on the 
seats, and under the seats, in the most wretched condi- 
tion. Never was such a blowing and raining, and pitch- 
ing and tossing, endured by any pleasure party before. 
Several remonstrances were sent down below, on the 
subject of Master Fleetwood, but they were totally un- 
heeded in consequence of the indisposition of his natural 
protectors. That interesting child screamed at the top 
of his voice, until he had no voice left to scream with ; 
and then, Miss Wakefield began, and screamed for the 
remainder of the passage. 

Mr. Haj’dy was observed, some hours afterwards, in 
an attitude which induced his friends to suppose that he 
was busily engaged in contemplating the beauties of the 
deep ; they only regretted that his taste for the pictu- 
resque should lead him to remain so long in a position, 


206 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


very injurious at all times, but especially so to au in* 
dividual laboring under a tendency of blood to the 
head. 

The party arri>'ed off the Custom House at about two 
o’clock on the Thursday morning, dispirited and woni 
out. The Tauntons were too ill to quarrel with the 
Briggses, and the Briggses were too wretched to annoy 
the Tauntons. One of the guitar-cases was lost on its 
passage to a hackney-coach, and Mrs. Briggs has not 
scrupled to state that the Tauntons bribed a porter to 
throw it down an area. Mr. Alexander Briggs opposes 
vote by ballot — he says from personal experience of its 
inefficacy; and Mr. Samuel Briggs, whenever he is 
asked to express his sentiments on the point, says he has 
no opinion on that or any other subject. 

Mr. Edkins — the young gentleman in the gi’een spec- 
tacles — makes a speech on every occasion on which a 
speech can possibly be made : the eloquence of which 
can only be equalled by its length. In the event of his 
not being previously appointed to a judgeship, it is prob- 
able that he will practise as a barrister in the new Cen- 
tral Criminal Court. 

Captain Helves continued his attention to Miss Julia 
Briggs, whom he might possibly have espoused, if it had 
not unfortunately happened that Mr. Samuel arrested 
him in the way of business, pursuant to instructions 
received from Messi-s. Scroggins and Payne, whose town- 
debts the gallant captain had condescended to collect, 
but whose accounts, with the indiscretion sometimes 
oeculiar to military minds, he had omitted to keep with 
ffiat dull accuracy which custom has rendered necessary. 
Mrs. Taunton complains that she has been much de- 
ceived in him. He introduced himself to the family on 


THE GREAT WINGLEBURY DUEL. 


207 


board a Gravesend steam-packet, and certainly, there- 
fore, ought to have proved respectable. 

Mr. Percy Noakes is as light-hearted and careless as 
ever. 


CHAPTER VIH. 

THE GREAT WINGLEBURY DUEL. 

The little town of Great Winglebury is exactly forty- 
two miles and three quarters from Hyde Park corner. 
It has a long, straggling, quiet High Street, with a great 
black and white clock at a small red Town Hall, half- 
way up — a market-place — a cage — an assembly-room 
— a church — a bridge — a chapel — a theatre — a 
library — an inn — a pump — and a Post-office. Tra- 
dition tells of a Little Winglebury,” down some cross- 
road about two miles off ; and, as a square mass of dirty 
paper, supposed to have been originally intended for a 
letter, with certain tremulous characters inscribed thereon, 
in which a lively imagination might trace a remote re- 
semblance to the word “ Little,” wa« once stuck up to be 
owned in the sunny window of the Great Winglebury 
Post-office, from which it only disappeared when it fell 
to pieces with dust and extreme old age, there would 
appear to be some foundation for the legend. Commor 
belief is inclined to bestow the name upon a little hole 
at the end of a muddy lane about a couple of miles 
long, colonized by one wheelwright, four paupers, and a 
beer-shop ; but even this authority, slight as it is, must 
be regarded with extreme suspicion, inasmuch as the 


208 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


inhabitants of the hole aforesaid, concur in opining that 
it never had any name at all, from the earliest ages down 
to the present day. 

The Winglebury Arms, in the centre of the High 
Street, opposite the small building with the big clock, is 
the principal inn of Great Winglebury — the commer- 
cial inn, posting-house, and excise-office ; the “ Blue ” 
house at every election, and the Judges’ house at every 
assizes. It is the headquarters of the Gentlemen’s 
AVhist Club of Winglebury Blues (so called in opposi- 
tion to the Gentlemen’s Whist Club of Winglebury 
Buffs, held at the other house, a little further down) ; 
and whenever a juggler, or wax-work man, or concert- 
giver, takes Great Winglebury in his circuit, it is imme- 
diately placarded all over the town that Mr. So-and-so, 
“ trusting to that liberal support which the inhabitants of 
Great Winglebury have long been so liberal in bestowing, 
has at a great expense engaged the elegant and commo- 
dious assembly-rooms, attached to the Winglebury Arms.” 
The house is a large one, with a red brick and stone 
front ; a pretty spacious hall, ornamented with evergreen 
plants, terminates in a perspective view of the bar, and 
a glass case, in which are displayed a choice variety of 
delicacies ready for dressing, to catch the eye of a new- 
comer the moment he enters, and excite his appetite to 
the highest possible pitch. Opposite doors lead to the 
“ coffee ” and “ commercial ” rooms ; and a great wide, 
rambling staircase, — three stairs and a landing — four 
stairs and another landing — one step and another land- 
ing — half a dozen stairs and another landing — and so 
on — conducts to galleries of bedrooms, and labyrinths 
of sitting-rooms, denominated “ private,” where you may 
enjoy yourself, as privately as you can in any place 


THE GREAT WINGLEBURY DUEL. 


209 


where some bewildered being walks into your room 
every five minutes, by mistake, and then walks out 
again, to open all the doors along the gallery until he 
finds his own. 

Such is the Winglebury Arms, at this day, and such 
was the Winglebury Arms some time since — no matter 
when — two or three minutes before the arrival of the 
London stage. Four horses with cloths on — change 
for a coach — were standing quietly at the corner of the 
yard, surrounded by a listless group of post-boys in shiny 
’hats and smock-frocks, engaged in discussing the merits 
of the cattle ; half a dozen ragged boys were standing 
a little apart, listening with evident interest to the con- 
versation of these worthies ; and a few loungers were 
collected round the horse-trough, aw^aiting the arrival of 
the coach. 

The day was hot and sunny, the town in the zenith of 
its dulness, and witli the exception of these few idlers, 
not a living creature was to be seen. Suddenly the loud 
notes of a key-bugle broke the monotonous stillness of 
the street ; in came the coach, rattling over the uneven 
paying wdth a noise startling enough to stop even the 
large-faced clock itself. Down got the outsides, up went 
the windows in all directions, out came the waiters, up 
started tlie hostlers, and the loungers, and the post-boys, 
and the ragged boys, as if they were electrified — un- 
strapping, and unchaining, and unbuckling, and dragging 
willing horses out, and forcing reluctant horses in, and 
making a most exhilarating bustle. Lady inside, here ! ” 
said the guard. “ Please to alight, ma’am,” said the 
waiter. “ Private sitting-room ? ” interrogated the 
lady. “ Certainly, ma’am,” responded the chamber- 
maid. “ Nothing but these ’ere trunks, ma’am ? ” in- 
14 


VOL. II. 


210 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


quired the guard. “Nothing more,” replied the lady. 
Up got the outsides again, and the guard, and the coach- 
man ; off came the cloths with a jerk, “ All right,” was 
the cry ; and away they went. The loungers lingered 
a minute or two in the road, watching the coach until 
it turned the corner, and then loitered away one by one. 
The street was clear again, and the town, by contrast, 
quieter than ever. 

. “ Lady in number twenty-five,” screamed the landlady. 
■ — “ Thomas ! ” 

“ Yes, ma’am.” 

“ Letter just been left for the gentleman in number 
nineteen. Boots at the Lion left it. No answer.” 

“Letter for you, sir,” said Thomas, depositing the 
letter on number nineteen’s table. 

“ For me ? ” said number nineteen, turning from the 
window, out of which he had been surveying the scene 
just described. 

“ Yes, sir,” — (waiters always speak in hints, and 
never utter complete sentences) — “ yes, sir, — Boots at 
the Lion, sir, — Bar, sir — Missus said number nineteen, 
sir — Alexander Trott, Esq., sir ? — your card at the 
bar, sir, I think, sir ? ” 

“ My name is Trott,” replied number nineteen, break- 
ing the seal. “ You may go, waiter.” The waiter pulled 
down the window-blind, and then pulled it up again — 
for a regular waiter must do something before he leaves 
the room — adjusted the glasses on the sideboard, 
brushed a place that was not dusty, rubbed his hands 
v^ery hard, walked stealthily to the door, and evapo- 
rated. 

There was, evidently, something in the contents of 
the letter of a nature, if not wholly unexpected, cer- 


THE GREAT WINGLEBURY DUEL. 


211 


tainly extremely disagreeable. Mr. Alexander Trott 
laid it down, and took it up again, and walked about the 
room on particular squares of the cai-pet, and even at- 
tempted, though unsuccessfully, to whistle an air. It 
wouldn’t do. He threw himself into a chair, and read 
the following epistle aloud : — 

, “ Blue Lion and Stomach-warmer, 

^ Great Winglebury. 

Wednesday Morning. 

“ Sir, — Immediately on discovering your intentions, 
I left our counting-house, and followed you. I know 
the purport of your journey ; — that journey shall never 
be completed. 

“ I have no friend here, just now, on whose secrecy I 
can rely. This shall be no obstacle to my revenge. 
Neither shall Emily Brown be exposed to the mercenary 
solicitations of a scoundrel, odious in her eyes, and con- 
temptible in everybody else’s : nor will I tamely submit 
to the clandestine attacks of a base umbrella-maker. 

“ Sir. From Great Winglebury church a footpath 
leads through four meadows to a retired spot known to 
the towns-pebple as Stiffun’s Acre.” [Mr. Trott shud- 
dered.] “ I shall be waiting there alone, at twenty 
minutes before six o’clock to-morrow morning. Should 
I be disappointed in seeing you there, I will do myself 
the pleasure of calling with a horsewhip. 

“ Horace Hunter. 

“ PS. There is a gunsmith’s in the High Street ; 
^nd they won’t sell gunpowder after dark — you under- 
stand me. 

PPS. You hai better not order your breakfast in 


212 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


the morning until you have met me. It may be an 
unnecessary expense.” 

“ Desperate-minded villain ! I knew how it would 
be ! ” ejaculated the terrified Trott. “ I always told 
father, that once start me on this expedition, and Hunter 
would pursue me like the Wandering Jew. It’s bad 
enough as it is, to marry with the old people’s com- 
mands, and without the girl’s consent; but what will 
Emily think of me, if I go down tliere, breathless with 
running away from this infernal salamander? What 
shall I do ? What can I do ? If I go back to the city, 
I’m disgraced forever — lose the girl — and, what’s 
more, lose the money too. Even if I did go on to the 
Browns’ by the coach. Hunter would be after me in a 
post-chaise ; and if I go to this place, this Stiffun’s Acre 
(another shudder). I’m as good as dead. I’ve seen him 
liit the man at the Pall Mall shooting-gallery in the 
second button-hole of the waistcoat, five times out of 
every six, and when he didn’t hit him there, he hit 
him in the head.” With this consolatory reminiscence, 
Mr. Alexander Trott again ejaculated, “ What shaU 
I do ? ” 

Long and weary were his reflections, as, burying his 
face in his hands, he sat ruminating on the best coui-se to 
be pursued. His mental direction-post pointed to Lon 
don. He thought of “ the governor’s ” anger, and the 
loss of the fortune which the paternal Brown had prom- 
ised the paternal Trott his daughter should contribute to 
the coffers of his sou. Then the words “ To Brown’s ” 
were legibly inscribed on the said direction-post, but 
Horace Hunter’s denunciation rung in his ears ; — last 
Df all it bore, in red letters, the words, “ To Stiffun’s 


THE GREAT WINGLEBURY DUEL. 


213 


Acre ; ” and then Mr. Alexander Trott decided on adopt- 
ing a plan which he presently matured. 

First and foremost, he despatched the under-boots to 
the Blue Lion and Stomach-w^armer, with a gentlemanly 
note to Mr. Horace Hunter, intimating that he thirsted 
for his destruction, and would do himself the pleasure 
of slaughtering him next morning, without fail. He 
then wrote another letter, and requested the attendance 
of the other boots — for they kept a pair. A modest 
knock at the room-door was heard. “ Come in,” said 
Mr. Trott. A man thrust in a red head with one eye in 
it, and being again desired to “ come in,” brought in the 
body and the legs to which the head belonged, and a fur 
cap which belonged to the head. 

“ You are the upper-boots, I think ? ” inquired Mr. 
Trott. 

“ Yes, I am the upper-boots,” replied a voice from in- 
side a velveteen case with mother-of-pearl buttons — 
“ that is, I’m the boots as b’longs to the house ; the 
other man’s my man, as goes errands, and does odd jobs. 
Top-boots and half- boots, I calls us.” 

“ You’re from London ? ” inquired Mr. Trott. 

“ Driv a cab once,” was the laconic reply. 

“ Why don’t you drive it now ? ” asked Mr. Trott. 

“ Over-driv the cab, and driv over a ’ooman,” replied 
the top-boots, with brevity. 

“ Do you know the mayor’s house ? ” inquired Trott. 

“ Rather,” replied the boots, significantly, as if he had 
some good reason to remember it. 

“ Do you think you could manage to leave a letter 
ihere ? ” interrogated Trott. 

‘^Shouldn’t wonder,” responded boots. 

“ But this letter,” said ^Trott, holding a deformed note 


214 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


mth a paralytic direction in one hand, and five shillings 
in the other — “ this letter is anonymous.” 

“A — what ? ” interrupted the boots. 

“ Anonymous — he’s not to know who it comes from.” 

“ Oh ! I see,” responded the reg’lar, with a knowing 
wink, but without evincing the slightest disinclination to 
undertake the charge — “I see — bit o’ Sving, eh ?” and 
his one eye wandered round the room, as if in quest of a 
dark lantern .and phosphorus-box. “ But, I say ! ” he 
continued, recalling the eye from its search, and bring- 
ing it to bear on Mr. Trott. “ I say, he’s a lawyer, our 
mayor, and insured in the County. If you’ve a spite 
agen him, you’d better not burn his house down — 
blessed if I don’t think it would be the greatest favor 
you could do him.” And he chuckled inwardly. 

If Mr. Alexander Trott had been in any other situa- 
tion, his first act would have been to kick the man down- 
stairs by deputy ; or, in other words, to ring the bell, and 
desire the landlord to take his boots off. He contented 
himself, however, with doubling the fee and explaining 
that the letter merely related to a breach of the peace. 
The top-boots retired, solemnly pledged to secrecy ; and 
Mr. Alexander Trott sat down to a fried sole, maintenon 
cutlet, Madeira, and sundries, with greater composure 
than he had experienced since the receipt of Horace 
Hunter’s letter of defiance. 

Tlie lady who alighted from the London coach had no 
sooner been installed in number twenty-five, and made 
some alteration in her travelling-dress, than she indited a 
note to Joseph Overton, esquire, solicitor, and mayor of 
Great Winglebury, requesting his immediate attendance 
an private business of paramount importance — a sum- 
mons which that worthy functionary lost no time in 


THE GREAT WINGLEBURY DUEL. 


215 


obeying ; for after sundry openings of his eyes, divers 
ejaculations of “ Bless me ! ” and other manifestations of 
surprise, he took his broad-brimmed hat from its accus- 
tomed peg in his little front office, and walked briskly 
down the High Street to the Winglebury Arms ; through 
the hall and up the staircase of which establishment he 
was ushered by the landlady, and a crowd of officious 
waiters, to the door of number twenty-five. 

“ Show the gentleman in,” said the stranger lady, in 
reply to the foremost waiter’s announcement. The gen- 
tleman was shown in accordingly. 

The lady rose from the sofa ; the mayor advanced a 
step from the door ; and there they both paused, for a 
minute or two, looking at one another as if by mutual 
consent. The mayor saw before him a buxom richly- 
dressed female of about forty ; the lady looked upon a 
sleek man, about ten years older, in drab shorts and con- 
tinuations, black coat, neckcloth, and gloves. 

“ Miss Julia Manners ! ” exclaimed the mayor at 
length, “you astonish me.” 

“ That’s very unfair of you, Overton,” replied Miss 
Julia, “for I have known you, long enough, not to be 
surprised at anything you do, and you might extend 
equal courfesy to me.” 

“ But to run away — actually run aw^ay — with a 
young man ! ” remonstrated the mayor. 

“ You wouldn’t have me actually run away with an 
old one, I presume ? ” was the cool rejoinder. 

“ And then to ask me — me — of ail people in the 
w'orld — a man of my age and appearance — mayor of 
the town — to promote such a scheme ! ” pettishly ejacu- 
lated Joseph Overton ; throwing himself into an arm- 
chair, and producing Miss Julia’s letter from his pocket, 


216 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


as if to corroborate the assertion that he had been 
asked. 

Now, Overton,” replied the lady, “ I want your 
assistance in this matter, and I must have it. In the 
lifetime of that poor old dear, Mr. Cornberry, who — 
who — ” 

“ Who was to have married you, and didn’t, because 
he died first; and who left -you his property unencum- 
bered with the addition of himself,” suggested the mayor. 

“ Well,” replied Miss Julia, reddening slightly, in the 
lifetime of the poor old dear, the property had the incum- 
brance of your management; and all I will say of that, 
is, that I only wonder it didn’t die of consumption in- 
stead of its master. You helped yourself then : — help 
me now.” 

Mr. Joseph Overton was a man of the world, and an 
attorney ; and as certain indistinct recollections of an 
odd thousand pounds or two, appropriated by mistake, 
passed across his mind, he hemmed deprecatingly, smiled 
blandly, remained silent for a few seconds ; and finally 
inquired, “ What do you wish me to do^? ” 

“I’ll tell you,” replied Miss Julia — “I’ll tell you in 
three words. Dear Lord Peter — ” 

“ That’s the young man, I suppose — ” interrupted the 
mayor. 

“ That’s the young Nobleman,” replied the lady, with 
a great stress on the last word. “ Dear Lord Peter is 
considerably afraid of the resentment of his family ; and 
we have therefore thought it better to make the match a 
stolen one. He left town, to avoid suspicion, on a visit 
to his friend, the Honorable Augustus Flair, whose seat, 
^is you know, is about thirty miles from this, accompa- 
nied only by his favorite tiger. We arranged that 1 


THE GREAT WINGLEBURY DUEL. 


217 


should come here alone in the London coach ; and that 
he, leaving his tiger and*cab behind him, should come on, 
and arrive here as soon as possible this afternoon.” 

“ Very well,” observed Joseph Overton, “ and then he 
can order the chaise, and you can go on to Gretna Green 
together, without requiring the presence or interference 
of a third party, can’t you ? ” 

“ No,” replied Miss Julia. “ We have every reason 
to believe — dear Lord Peter not being considered very 
prudent or sagacious by his friends, and they having dis- 
covered his attachment to me — that, immediately on his 
absence being observed, pursuit will be made in this di- 
rection : to elude which, and to prevent our being traced, 
I wish it to be understood in this house, that dear Lord 
Peter is slightly deranged, though perfectly harmless ; 
and that I am, unknown to him, awaiting his arrival to 
convey him in a post-chaise to a private asylum — at 
Berwick, say. If I don’t show myself much, I dare say 
I can manage to pass for his mother.” 

The thought occurred to the mayor’s mind that the 
lady might show herself a good deal without fear of 
detection ; seeing that she was about double the age of 
her intended husband. He said nothing, however, and 
the lady proceeded. 

“ With the whole of this arrangement dear Lord Peter 
I's acquainted ; and all I want you to do, is, to make the 
delusion more complete by giving it the sanction of your 
influence in this place, and assigning this as a reason to 
the people of the house for my taking the young gentle- 
man away. As it would not be consistent with the story 
that I should see him until after he has entered the 
chaise, I also wish you to communicate with him, and 
inform him that it is all going on well.” 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


ai8 

“ Has he arrived ? ” inquired Overton. 

“ I don’t kno^,” replied the lady. 

“ Then how am I to know ?” inquired the mayor. “ Of 
course he will not give his own name at the bar.’’ 

“ I begged him, immediately on his amval, to write 
you a note,” replied Miss Mamiers ; “ and to prevent the 
possibility of our project being discovered through its 
means, I desired him to write anonymously, and in mys- 
terious terms to acquaint you with the number of his 
room.” 

“ Bless me ! ” exclaimed the mayor, rising from his 
seat, and searching his pockets — “ most extraordinary 
circumstance — he has arrived — mysterious note left at 
my house in a most mysterious manner, just before yours 
— didn’t know what to make of it before, and certainly 
shouldn’t have attended to it. — Oh ! here it is.” And 
Joseph Overton pulled out of an inner coat-pocket the 
identical letter penned by Alexander Trott. “ Is this 
his lordship’s hand ? ” 

‘‘ Oh yes,” replied Julia ; “ good, punctual creature ! I 
have not seen it more than once or twice, but I know he 
writes very badly and very larger These dear, wild 
young noblemen, you know, Overton — ” 

“ Ay, ay, I see,” replied the mayor. — ‘‘ Horses and 
dogs, play and wine — grooms, actresses, and cigars — 
the stable, the green-room, the saloon, and the tavern ; 
and the legislative assembly at last.” 

“ Here’s what he says,” pursued the mayor ^ ‘ Sir, — • 
A young gentleman in number nineteen at the Wingle- 
bury Arms, is bent on committing a rash act to-morrow 
morning at an early hour.’ (Tliat s good — he means 
manning.) ‘ If you have any regard for the peace of 
this town, or the preservation of one — it may be two 


THE GREAT WINGLEBURY DUEL. 


219 


— human lives ’ — What the deuce does he mean by 
that?” 

“ That he’s so anxious for the ceremony, he will expire 
if it’s put off, and that I may possibly do the same, re- 
plied the lady with great complacency. 

“ Oh ! I see — not much fear of that ; — well — ^ two 
human lives, you will cause him to be removed to-night/ 
(He wants to start at once.) ‘ Fear not to do this on 
your responsibility : for to-morrow the absolute necessity 
of the proceeding will be but too apparent. Remember : 
number nineteen. The name is Trott. No delay ; for 
life and death depend upon your promptitude.’ Passion- 
ate language, certainly. Shall I see him ? ” 

“ Do,” replied Miss Julia ; “ and entreat him to act his 
part well. I am half afraid of him. Tell him to be 
cautious.” 

“ I will,” said the mayor. 

“ Settle all the arrangements.” 

“ I will,” said the mayor again. 

“ And say I think the chaise had better be ordered for 
one o’clock.” 

“ Very well,” said the mayor once more ; and, rumi- 
nating on the absurdity of the situation in which fate 
and old acquaintance had placed him, he desired a waiter 
to herald his approach to the temporary representative 
of number nineteen. 

The announcement, “ Gentleman to speak with you, 
sir,” induced ]Mi\ Trott to pause half way in the glass of 
port, the contents of which he was in the act of imbibing 
at the moment ; to rise from his chair ; and retreat a few 
paces towards the window, as if to secure a retreat, in 
the event of the visitor assuming the form and appear- 
ince of Horace Hunter. One glance at Joseph Overton, 


220 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


however, quieted his apprehensions. He courteously 
motioned the stranger to a seat. The waiter, after a 
little jingling with the decanter and glasses, consented 
to leave the room ; and Joseph Overton, placing the 
broad-brimmed hat on the chair next him, and bending 
his body gently forward, opened the business by saying 
in a very low and cautious tone, — 

“ My lord — ” 

“ Eh ? ” said Mr. Alexander Trott, in a loud key, with 
the vacant and mystified stare of a chilly somnambulist. 

“ Hush — hush ! ” said the cautious attorney ; “ to be 
sure — quite right — no titles here — my name is Over- 
ton, sir.’’ 

“ Overton ? ” 

“ Yes : the mayor of this place — you sent me a letter 
with anonymous information, this afternoon.” 

“ I, sir ? ” exclaimed Trott with ill-dissembled sur- 
prise ; for, coward as he was, he would willingly have 
repudiated the authorship of the letter in question. “ I, 
sir ? ” 

“ Yes, you, sir ; did you not ? ” responded Overton, 
annoyed with what he supposed to be an extreme degree 
of unnecessary suspicion. “ Either this letter is youi'S, 
or it is not. If it be, we can convei'se securely upon the 
subject at once. If it be not, of course I have no more 
to say.” 

“ Stay, stay,” said Trott, “ it is mine ; I did write it. 
What could I do, sir ? I had no friend here.” 

“ To be sure, to be sure,” said the mayor, encourag- 
ingly, “ you could not have managed it better. Well, 
sir ; it will be necessary for you to leave here to-night in 
a post-chaise and four. And the harder the boys drive, 
the better You are not safe from pursuit.” 


THE GREAT WINGLEBURY DUEL. 


221 


“ Bless me ! ” exclaimed Trott, in an agony of appre- 
hension, “ can such things happen in a country like this ? 
Sucli unrelenting and cold-blooded hostility ! ” He 
wiped off the concentrated essence of cowardice that was 
oozing fast down his forehead, and looked aghast at 
Joseph Overton, 

“ It certainly is a very hard case,” replied the mayor 
with a smile, “ that, in a free country, people can’t marry 
whom they like, without being hunted down as if they 
were criminals. However, in the present instance the 
lady is willing, you know, and that’s the main point, after 
all.” 

“ Lady willing ! ” repeated Trott, mechanically. “ How 
do you know the lady’s willing ? ” 

“ Come, that’s a good one,” said the mayor, benevo- 
lently tapping Mr. Trott on the arm with his broad- 
brimmed hat ; “ I have known her, well, for a long time ; 
and if anybody could entertain the remotest doubt on 
the subject, I assure you I have none, nor need you 
have.” 

“ Dear me ! ” said Mr. Trott, ruminating. “ This is 
very extraordinary ! ” 

“ Well, Lord Peter,” said the mayor, rising. 

“ Lord Peter ? ” repeated Mr. Trott. 

« Oh — ah, I forgot. Mr. Trott, then — Trott — very 
good, ha! ha ! — Well, sir, the chaise shall be ready at 
half-past twelve.” 

. “ And what is to become of me until then ? ” inquired 
Mr. Trott, anxiously. “ Wouldn’t it save appearances, 
if I were placed under some restraint ? ” 

Ah I ” replied Overton, “ very good thought — capital 
dea indeed. I’ll send somebody up directly. And if 
you make a little resistance when we put you in the 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


chaise, it wouldn’t be amiss — look as if you didn’t want 
to be taken away, you know.” 

‘‘ To be sure,” said Trott — “ to be sure.” 

“ Well, my lord,” said Overton, in a low tone, “ until 
then, I wish your lordship a good evening.” 

“ Lord — lordship ? ” ejaculated Trott again, falling 
back a step or two, and gazing, in unutterable wonder, on 
the countenance of the mayor. 

“ Ha-ha ! I see, my lord — practising the madman ? 
— very good indeed — very vacant look — capital, my 
lord, capital — good evening, Mr. — Trott — ha ! ha ! 



“ That mayor’s decidedly drunk,” soliloquized Mr. 
Trott, throwing himself back in his chair, in an attitude 
of reflection. 

“ He is a much cleverer fellow than I thought him, 
that young nobleman — he carries it off uncommonly 
well,” thought Overton, as he went his way to the har, 
there to complete his arrangements. This was soon 
done. Every word of the story was implicitly believed, 
and the one-eyed boots was immediately instructed to 
repair to number nineteen, to act as custodian of the per- 
son of the supposed lunatic until half-past twelve o’clock. 
In pursuance of this direction, that somewhat eccentric 
gentleman armed himself with a walking-stick of gigan- 
tic dimensions, and repaired, with his usual equanimity 
of manner, to Mr. Trott’s apartment, which he entered 
without any ceremony, and mounted guard in, by quietly 
depositing himself on a chair near the door, where he 
proceeded to beguile the time by whistling a popular air 
with great apparent satisfaction. 

“ What do you want here, you scoundrel ? ” exclaimed 
Mr. Alexander Trott, with a proper appearance of indig- 
aatiyn at -liis detention. 


THE GREAT WINGLEBURY DUEL. 


223 


The boots beat time with his head, as he looked gently 
round at Mr. Trott with a smile of pity, and whistled an 
adagio movement. 

“ Do you attend in this room by Mr. Overton’s de- 
sire ? ” inquired Trott, rather astonished at the man’s 
demeanor. 

“ Keep yourself to yourself, young feller,'*’ calmly re- 
sponded the boots, “ and don’t say nothin’ to nobody.” 
And he whistled again. 

“ Now, mind ! ” ejaculated Mr. Trott, anxious to keep 
up the farce of wishing with great earnestness to fight a 
duel if they’d let him. “ I protest against being kept 
here. I deny that I have any intention of fighting with 
anybody. But, as it’s useless contending with superior 
numbers, I shall sit quietly down.” 

♦ “ You’d better,” observed the placid boots, shaking the 
large stick expressively. 

“Under protest, however,” added Alexander Trott, 
seating himself, with indignation in his face, but great 
content in his heart. “ Under protest.” 

“ Oh, certainly ! ” responded the boots ; “ anything you 
please. If you’re happy, I’m transported ; only don’t 
talk too much — it’ll make you worse.” 

“ Make me worse ? ” exclaimed Trott, in unfeigned 
astonishment : “ The man’s drunk ! ” 

“ You’d better be quiet, young feller,” remarked the 
boots, going through a threatening piece of pantomime 
with the stick. 

“ Or mad ! ” said Mr. Trott, rather alarmed. “ Leave 
the room, sir, and tell them to send somebody else.” 

“ Won’t do ! ” replied the boots. 

“ Leave the room ! ” shouted Trott, ringing the bell 
violently ; for he began to be alarmed on a new score. 


224 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


“ Leave that ’ere bell alone, you wretched loo-nattic ! * 
said the boots, suddenly forcing the unfortunate TroU 
back into his chair, and brandishing the stick aloft. “ Be 
quiet, you mis’rable object, and don’t let everybody know 
there’s a madnxan in the house.” 

“ He is a madman ! He is a madman ! ” exclaimed 
the terrified Mr. Trott, gazing on the one eye of the red- 
headed boots Avith a look of abject horror. 

“ Madman ! ” replied the boots, “ dam’me, I think he 
is a madman with a vengeance ! Listen to me, you un- 
fort’nate. Ah ! would you ? ” [a slight tap on the head 
with the large stick, as Mr. Trott made another move 
towards the bell-handle] “ I caught you there ! did I ? ” 

“ Spare my life ! ” exclaimed Trott, raising his hands 
imploringly. 

“I don’t want your life,” replied the boots, disdain-*- 
fully, “ though I think it ’ud be a charity if somebody 
took it.” 

“ No, no, it Avouldn’t,” interrupted poor Mr. Trott, 
hurriedly ; “ no, no, it wouldn’t ! I — I — ’d rather keep 
it!” 

“ O werry well,” said the boots ; “ that’s a mere mat- 
ter of taste — ev’ry one to his likhig. Hows’ever, all 
I’ve got to say is this here : You sit quietly down in that 
chair, and I’ll sit hoppersite you here, and if you keep 
quiet and don’t stir, I Avon’t damage you ; but if you 
move hand or foot till half-past tAA^elve o'clock, ! shall 
alter the expression of your countenance so completely, 
that the next time you look in the glass you’ll ask vether 
you’re gone out of toAvn, and ven you’re likely to come 
back again. So sit doAvn.” 

“ I will — I Avill,” responded the victim of mistakes j 
and down sat Mr. Trott and down sat the boots too, ex- 


THE GREAT WINGLEBURY DUEL. 226 

actly opposite him, with the stick ready for immediate 
action in case of emergency. 

Long and dreary were the hours that followed. The 
bell of Great Winglebury church had just struck ten, 
and two hours and a half would probably elapse before 
succor arrived. For half an hour, the noise occasioned 
by shutting up the shops in the street beneath, betokened 
something like life in the town, and rendered Mr. Trott’s 
situation a little less insupportable ; but, when even these 
ceased, and nothing was heard beyond tlie occasional 
rattling of a post-chaise as it drove up the yard to 
change horses, and then drove away again, or the clat- 
tering of horses’ hoofs in the stables behind, it became 
almost unbearable. The boots occasionally moved an 
inch or two, to knock superfluous bits of wax off the 
candles, which were burning low, but instantaneously 
resumed his former position ; and as he remembered to 
have heard, somewhere or other, that the human eye had 
an unfailing effect in controlling mad people, he kept his 
solitary organ of vision constantly fixed on Mr. Alex- 
ander Trott. That unfortunate individual stared at his 
companion in his turn, until his features grew more and 
more indistinct — his hair gradually less red — and the 
room more misty and obscure. Mr. Alexander Trott 
fell into a sound sleep, from which he was awakened 
by a rumbling in the street, and a cry of “ Chaise-and- 
four for number twenty-five ! A bustle on the stairs 
succeeded ; the room-door was hastily thrown open ; and 
Mr. Joseph Overton entered, followed by four stout 
waiters, and Mrs. Williamson, the stout landlady of the 
Winglebury Arms. 

“Mr. Overton!” exclaimed Mr. Alexander Trott, 
jumping up in a frenzy, “ Look at this man, sir ; con* 

voii. 11 . 15 


226 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


aider the situation in which I have been placed for three 
hours past — the person you sent to guard me, sir, was 
a madman — a madman — a raging, ravaging, furious 
madman.” 

“ Bravo ! ” whispered Overton. 

“ Poor dear ! ” said the compassionate Mrs. Wil- 
liamson, “ mad people always thinks other people’s 
mad.” . 

“ Poor dear ! ” ejaculated Mr. Alexander Trott, “ What 
the devil do ^ou mean by poor dear ! Are you the land- 
lady of this house ? ” 

“Yes, yes,” replied the stout old lady, “don’t exert 
yourself, there’s a dear ! Consider your health, now ; 
do.” 

“ Exert myself ! ” shouted Mr. Alexander Trott, “it’s 
a mercy, ma’am, that I have any breath to exert myself 
with ! I might have been assassinated three hours ago 
by that one-eyed monster with the oakym head. How 
dare you have a madman, ma’am, how dare you have 
a madman, to assault and terrify the visitoi’s to your 
house ? ” 

“ I’ll never have another,” said Mrs. Williamson, cast- 
ing a look of reproach at the mayor. 

“ Capital, capital,” whispered Overton again, as he 
enveloped Mr. Alexander Trott in a thick travelling- 
cloak. 

“ Capital, sir ! ” exclaimed Trott, aloud, “ it’s horrible. 
The very recollection makes me shudder. I’d rather 
fight four duels in three hours, if I survived the first 
three, than I’d sit for that time face to face with a 
madman.” 

“ Keep it up, my Lord, as you go down-staii*s,” whis- 
pered Overton, your bill is paid, and your portmanteau 


THE GREAT VVINGLEBURY DUEL. 


227 


In the chaise.” ^And then, he added aloud, “ Now, wait* 
ers, the gentleman’s ready.” 

At this signal, the v/aiters crowded round Mr. Alex- 
ander Trott. One, took one arm ; another, the other ; a 
third, walked before with a candle ; the fourth, behind, 
with another candle: the boots and Mrs. Williamson 
brought up the rear; and down-stairs they went: Mr. 
Alexander Trott, expressing alternately at the very top 
of his voice either his feigned reluctance to go, or his 
unfeigned indignation at being shut up with a madman. 

Mr. Overton was waiting at the chaise-door, the boys 
were ready mounted, and a few hostlers and stable nonde- 
scripts were standing round to witness the departure of 

the mad gentleman.” Mr. Alexander Trott’s foot was 
on the step, when he observed (which the dim light had 
prevented his doing before) a figure seated in the chaise, 
closely muflled up in a cloak like his own. 

Who’s that ? ” he inquired of Overton in a whisper. 

“ Hush, hush,” replied the mayor ; “ the other party 
of course.” 

“ The other party ! ” exclaimed Trott, with an effort 
to retreat. 

“ Yes, yes ; you’ll soon find that out, before you go far, 
I should think — but make a noise, you’ll excite suspicion 
if you whisper to me so much.” 

‘‘ I won’t go in this chaise ! ” shouted Mr. Alexander 
Trott, all his original fears recurring with tenfold vio- 
lence. I shall be assassinated — I shall be — ” 

“ Bravo, bravo,” whispered Overton. “ I’ll push you 
in.” 

“ But I won’t go,” exclaimed Mr. Trott. “ Help here, 
help ! They’re carrying me away against my will. This 
’J8 a plot to murder me.” 


228 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


‘‘ Poor dear ! ” said Mrs. Williamson again. 

“ Now, boys, put ’em along,” cried the mayor, pushing 
Trott in and slamming the door. “ Off with you, as 
quick as you can^ and stop for nothing till you come to 
the next stage — all right ! ” 

“ Horses are paid, Tom,” screamed Mrs. Williamson ; 
and away went the chaisej at the rate of fourteen miles 
an hour, with Mr. Alexander Trott and Miss Julia Man- 
ners carefully shut up in the inside. 

Mr. Alexander Trott remained coiled up in one comer 
of the chaise, and his mysterious companion in the other, 
for the first two or three miles ; Mr. Trott edging more 
and more into his comer, as he felt his companion gradu- 
ally edging more and more from hers ; and vainly en- 
deavoring in the darkness to catch a glimpse of the 
furious face of the supposed Horace Hunter. 

“ We may speak now,” said his fellow-traveller, at 
length; “the post-boys can neither see nor hear us.” 

“ That’s not Hunter’s voice ! ” — thought Alexander, 
astonished. 

“ Dear Lord Peter ! ” said Miss Julia, most winningly : 
putting her arm on Mr. Trott’s shoulder. “ Dear Lord 
Peter. Not a word ? ” 

“ Why, it’s a woman ! ” exclaimed Mr. Trott, in a low 
tone of excessive wonder. 

“Ah! Whose voice is that?” said Julia ; “ ’tis not 
Lord Peter’s.” 

“No, — it’s mine,” replied Mr. Trott. 

“ Yours 1 ” ejaculated Miss Julia Manners ; “ a strange 
man 1 Gracious heaven I How came you here ? ” 

“ Whoever you are, you might have known that I came 
against my will, ma’am,” replied Alexander, “ for I made 
noise enough when I got in.” 


THE GREAT WINGLEBURY DUEL. 229 

“ Do you come from Lord Peter ? ” inquired Miss 
Manners. 

“ Confound Lord Peter,” replied Trott pettishly. “ I 
don’t know any Lord Peter. I never heard of him be- 
fore to-night, when Ive been Lord Peter’d by one and 
Lord Peter’d by another, till I verily believe Pm mad, 
or dreaming — ” 

“ Whither are we going ? ” inquired the lady tragi- 
cally. 

“ How should I know, ma’am ? ” replied Trott with 
singular coolness ; for the events of the evening had 
completely hardened him. 

“ Stop ! stop ! ” cried the lady, letting down the front 
glasses of the chaise. 

“ Stay, my dear ma’am ! ” said Mr. Trott, pulling the 
glasses up again with one hand, and gently squeezing 
Miss Julia’s waist with the other. “ There is some mis- 
take here ; give me till the end of this stage to explain 
my share of it. We must go so far ; you cannot be set 
down here alone, at this hour of the night.” 

The lady consented ; the mistake was mutually ex- 
plained, Mr. Trott was a young man, had highly promis- 
ing whiskers, an undeniable tailor, and an insinuating 
address — he wanted nothing but valor, and who wants 
that with three thousand a year ? The lady had this, 
and more ; she wanted a young husband, and the only 
course open to Mr. Trott to retrieve his disgrace was fi 
rich wife. So, they came to the conclusion that it would 
be a pity to have all this trouble and expense for noth- 
ing ; and that as they were so far on the road already, 
they had better go to Gretna Green, and many each 
other ; and they did so. And the very next preceding 
entry in the Blacksmith’s book, was an entry of the mar- 


280 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


riage of Emily Brown with Horace Hunter. Mr. Hun- 
ter took his wife home, and begged pardon, and was par- 
doned ; and Mr. Trott took his wife home, begged pardon 
too, and was pardoned also. And Lord Peter, who had 
been detained beyond his time by drinking champagne 
and riding a steeple-chase, went back to the Honorable 
Augustus Flair’s and drank more champagne, and rode 
another steeple-chase, and was thrown and killed. And 
Horace Hunter took great credit to himself for practis- 
ing on the cowardice of Alexander Trott; and all these 
circumstances were discovered in time, and carefully 
noted down ; and if you ever stop a week at the Wingle- 
bury Arms, they will give you just this account of The 
Great Winglebury Duel. 


CHAPTER IX. 

MRS. JOSEPH PORTER. 

Most extensive were the preparations at Rose Villa, 
Clapham Rise, in the occupation of Mr. Gattleton (a 
stockbroker in especially comfortable circumstances), and 
great was the anxiety of Mr. Gattleton’s interesting 
family, as the day fixed for the representation of the 
Private Play which had been “ many months in prepara- 
tion,” approached. The whole family was infected with 
the mania for Private Theatricals ; the house, usually so 
clean and tidy, was, to use Mr. Gattleton’s expressive 
description, “ regularly turned out o’ witidows ; ” the 
large dining-room, dismantled of its furniture and orna- 
oaents, presented a strange jumble of flats, flies, wings, 


MRS. JOSEPH PORTER. 


281 


lamps, bridges, clouds, thunder and lightning, festoons 
and flowers, daggers and foil, and various other messes 
in theatrical slang included under the comprehensive 
name of “ properties.” The bedrooms were crow^ded 
with scenery, the kitchen w^as occupied by carpenters. 
Rehearsals took place every other night in the drawing- 
room, and every sofa in the house was more or less dam- 
aged by the perseverance and spirit wdth which Mr. 
Sempronius Gattleton, and Miss Lucina, rehearsed the 
smothering scene in “ Othello ” — it having been deter- 
mined that that tragedy should form the first portion of 
the evening’s entertainments. 

“ When we’re a leeile more perfect, I think it will go 
admirably,” said Mr. Sempronius, addressing his corps 
dramatique, at the conclusion, of the hundred and fiftieth 
rehearsal. In consideration of his sustaining the trifling 
inconvenience of bearing all the expenses of the play, 
Mr. Sempronius had been, in the most handsome manner, 
unanimously elected stage-manager. “ Evans,” continued 
jNIr. Gattleton, the younger, addressing a tall, thin, pale 
young gentleman, with extensive whiskers. “ Evans, you 
play Roderigo beautifully.” 

“ Beautifully ! ” echoed the three Miss Gattletons ; for 
Mr. Evans was pronounced by all his lady friends to be 
‘‘ quite a dear.” He looked so interesting, and had such 
lovely whiskers : to say nothing of his talent for writing 
verses in albums and playing the flute'! Roderigo sim- 
pered and bowed. 

“ But I think,” added the manager, “ you are hardly 
perfect in the — fall — in the fencing-scene, where you 
are — you u;iderstand ? ” 

“It’s very ditficult,” said Mr. Evans, thoughtfully 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


832 

“ Fve fallen about, a good deal, in our counting-house 
lately for practice, only I find it hurts one so. Being 
obliged to tall backwards you see, it bruises one’s head 
a good deal.” 

“ But you must take care you don’t knock a wing 
down,” said Mr. Gattleton, the elder, who had been ap- 
pointed prompter, and who took as much interest in the 
play as the youngest of the company. “The stage is 
very narrow, you know.” 

“ Oh ! don’t be afraid,” said Mr. Evans, with a very 
self-satisfied air : “ I shall fall with my head ‘ off,’ and 
then I can’t do any harm.” 

“ But, egad ! ” said the manager, rubbing his hands, 
“ we shall make a decided hit in ‘ Masaniello.’ Harleigh 
sings that music admirably.” 

Everybody echoed the sentiment. Mr. Harleigh smiled, 
and looked foolish — not an unusual thing with him — 
hummed “ Behold how brightly breaks the morning,” 
and blushed as red as the fisherman’s nightcap he was 
trying on. 

“ Let’s see,” resumed the manager, telling the number 
on his fingers, “ we shall have three dancing female peas- 
ants, besides Fenella, and four fishermen. Then, there’s 
our man Tom ; he can have a pair of ducks of mine, and 
a check shirt of Bob’s, and a red nightcap, and he’ll do 
for another — that’s five. In the choruses, of course, we 
can sing at the sides ; and in the market-scene, we can 
walk about in cloaks and things. When the revolt takes 
place, Tom must keep rushing in on one side and out on 
the other, with a pickaxe, as fast as he can. The effect 
will be electrical ; it will look exactly as if there were 
an immense number of ’em. And in the eruption scene 


MRS. JOSEPH PORTER. 


ive must burn the red fire, and upset the tea-trays, and 
make all sorts of noises — and it’s sure to do.” 

“ Sure ! sure ! ” cried all the performers %ina voce — 
and away hurried Mr. Sempronius Gattleton to wash the 
burnt cork off his face, and superintend the “ setting up ” 
of some of the amateur-painted, and never-sufficiently- 
^ to-be-admired, scenery. 

Mrs. Gattleton was a kind, good-tempered, vulgar soul, 
exceedingly fond of her husband and children, and enter- 
taining only three dislikes. In the first place, she had a 
natural antipathy to anybody else’s unmarried daughters ; 
in the second, she was in bodily fear of anything in the 
shape of ridicule ; lastly — almost a necessary conse- 
quence of this feeling — she regarded, with feelings of 
the utmost horror, one Mrs. Joseph Porter over the way. 
However, the good folks of Clapham and its vicinity 
stood very much in awe of scandal and sarcasm ; and 
thus Mrs. Joseph Porter was courted, and flattered, and 
caressed, and invited, for much the same reason that in- 
duces a poor author, without a farthing in his pocket, to 
behave with extraordinary civility to a two-penny post- 
man. 

“ Never mind, ma,” said Miss Emma Porter, in collo- 
quy with her respected relative, and trying to look uncon- 
cerned ; “ if they had invited me, you know that neither 
you nor pa would have allowed me to take part in such 
an exhibition.” 

“ Just what I should have thought from your high 
sense of propriety,” returned the mother. “ I am glad 
o see, Emma, you know how to designate .the proceed- 
ing.” Miss P., by the by, had only the week before 
made “ an exhibition ” of herself for four days, behind a 
'X)unter at a fancy fair, to all and every of her Majesty’s 


284 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


liege subjects who were disposed to pay a shilling each 
for the privilege of seeing some four dozen girls flirting 
with strangers, and playing at shop. 

“ There ! ” said Mrs. Porter, looking out of window ; 
“ there are two rounds of beef and a ham going in — 
clearly for sandwiches ; and Thomas, the pastry-cook, 
says, there have been twelve dozen tarts ordered, be- 
sides blanc-mange and jellies. Upon my word ! think 
of the Miss Gattletons in fancy dresses, too ! ” 

“ Oh^ it’s too ridiculous ! ” said Miss Porter, hys- 
terically. 

“ I’ll manage to put them a little out of conceit with 
the business, however,” said Mrs. Porter ; and out she 
went on her charitable errand. 

“ Well, my dear Mrs. Gattleton,” said Mrs. Joseph 
Porter, after they had been closeted for some time, and 
when, by dint of indefatigable pumping, she had man- 
aged to extract all the news about the play, “ well, my 
dear, people may say what they please ; indeed we know 
they will, for some folks are so ill-natured. Ah, my dear 
Miss Lucina, how d’ye do? I was just telling your 
mamma that I have heard it said, that — ” 

“What?” 

“ Mrs. Porter is alluding to the play, my dear,” said 
Mrs. Gattleton; “she was, I am sorry to say, just in- 
forming me that — ” 

“ Oh, now pray don’t mention it,” interrupted Mrs. 
Porter ; “ it’s most absurd — quite as absurd as young 
What’s-his-name saying he wondered how Miss Caroline 
with such a foot and ankle, could have the vanity to play 
F mella” 

“ Highly impertinent, whoever said it,” said Mrs. Gat* 
tleton, bridling up. 


MRS. JOSEPH PORTER. 


235 


“ Certainly, my dear,” chimed in the delighted Mrs. 
Porter ; “ most undoubtedly ! Because, as I said, if Miss 
Caroline does play Fenella, it doesn’t follow, as a matter 
of course, that she should think she has a pretty foot ; 
and then — such puppies as these young men are — he 
had the impudence to say, that — ” 

How far the amiable Mrs. Porter might have suc- 
ceeded in her pleasant purpose, it is impossible to say, 
had not the entrance of Mr. Thomas Balderstone, Mrs. 
Gattleton’s brother, familiarly called in the family “ Uncle 
Tom,” changed the course of conversation, and suggested 
to her mind an excellent plan of operation on the even- 
ing of the play. 

Uncle Tom was very rich, and exceedingly fond of his 
nephews and nieces : as a matter of course, therefore, 
he was an object of great importance in his own family 
He was one of the best-hearted men in existence ; always 
in a good temper, and always talking. It was his boast 
that he wore top-boots on all occasions, and had never 
worn a black silk neckerchief ; and it was his pride that 
he remembered all the principal plays of Shakspeare 
from beginning to end — and so he did. The result of 
this parrot-like accomplishment was, that he was not only 
perpetually quoting himself, but that he could never sit 
by and hear a misquotation from the “ Swan of Avon ” 
without setting the unfortunate delinquent right. He 
was also something of a wag ; never missed an oppor- 
tunity of saying what he considered a good thing, and 
invariably laughed until he cried at anything that ap- 
peared to him mirth-moving or ridiculous. 

“ Well, girls ! ” said Uncle Tom, after the preparatory 
ceremony of kissing and how-d’ye-do-ing had been gone 
.hrough — “ how d’ye get on ? Know your parts, eh ? — 


236 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


Lucina, my dear, act ii., scene 1 — place, left — cue — 
Unknown fate,’ — What’s next, eh ? — Go on — ‘ The 
heavens — ’ ” 

“ Oh, yes,” said Miss Lucina, “ I recollect — 

, ‘ The heavens forbid 

But that our loves and comforts should increase 
Even as our days do grow !’ ” 

“ Make a pause here and there,” said the old gentle- 
man, who was a great critic. ‘ But that our loves and 
comforts should increase ’ — emphasis on the last sylla- 
ble, ‘ crease,’ — loud ‘ even,’ — one, two, . three, four ; 
then loud again, ‘ as our days do grow ; ’ emphasis on 
days. That’s the way, my dear ; trust to your uncle for 
emphasis. Ah ! Sam, my boy, how are you ? ” 

“ Very well, thankee uncle,” returned Mr. Sempro- 
nius, who had just appeared, looking something like a 
ring-dove, with a small circle round each eye : the result 
of his constant corking. “ Of course we see you on 
Thursday.” 

“ Of course, of course, my dear boy.” 

“ What a pity it is your nephew didn’t think of mak- 
ing you prompter, Mr. Balderstone ! ” whispered Mrs. 
Joseph Porter ; “ you would have been invaluable.” 

“ Well, I flatter myself, I should have been tolerably 
up to the thing,” responded Uncle Tom. 

“ I must bespeak sitting next you on the night,” re- 
sumed Mrs. Porter ; “ and then, if our dear young friends 
here should be at all wrong, you will be able to enlighten 
me, I shall be so interested.” 

“ I am sure I shall be most happy to give you any 
assistance in my power.” 

“ Mind, it’s a bargain.” 

« Certainly.” 


SIRS. JOSEPH PORTER. 


237 


“ I don’t know how it is,” said Mrs. Gattleton to her 
daughters, as they were sitting round the fire in the even- 
ing, looking over their parts, “ but I really very much 
wish Ml'S. Joseph Porter wasn’t coming on Thursday. 
I am sure she’s scheming something.” 

“ She can’t make us ridiculous, however,” observed 
]Mr. Sempronius Gattleton, haughtily. 

The long-looked-for Thursday arrived in due course, 
and brought with it, as Mr. Gattleton, senior, philo- 
sophically observed, “no disappointments to speak of.” 
True, it was yet a matter of doubt whether Cassio would 
be enabled to get into the dress which had been sent for 
him from the masquerade warehouse. It was equally 
uncertain whether the principal female singer would be 
suflSciently recovered from the influenza to make her 
appearance ; Mr. Harleigh, the Masaniello of the night, 
was hoarse, and rather unwell, in consequence of the 
great quantity of lemon and sugar-candy he had eaten to 
improve his voice ; and two flutes and a violoncello had 
pleaded severe colds. What of that ? the audience were 
all coming. Everybody knew his part ; the dresses were 
covered with tinsel and spangles ; the white plumes 
looked beautiful ; Mr. Evans had practised falling until 
he was bruised from head to foot and quite perfect ; lago 
was sure that in the stabbing-scene, he should make “ a 
decided hit.” A self-taught deaf gentleman, who had 
kindly offered to bring his flute, would be a most valu- 
able addition to the orchestra ; Miss Jenkins’s talent for 
the piano was too well known to be doubted for an in- 
stant ; Mr. Cape had practised the violin accompaniment 
with her, frequently ; and IVIr. Brown, who had kindly 
undeitaken, at a few hours’ notice, to bring his violon- 
tello, w'ould, no doubt, manage extremely well. 


288 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


Seven o’clock came, and so did the audience ; all the 
rank and fashion of Clapham and its vicinity was fast 
filling the theatre. There were the Smiths, the Gub- 
binses, the Nixons, the Dixons, the Hicksons, people 
with all sorts of names, two aldermen, a sheriff in per- 
spective, Sir Thomas Glumper (who had been knighted 
in the last reign for carrying up an address on some- 
body’s escaping from nothing) ; and last, not least, there 
were Mrs. Joseph Porter and Uncle Tom, seated in the 
centre of the third row from the stage ; Mrs. P. amusing 
Uncle Tom with all sorts of stories, and Uncle Tom 
amusing every one else by laughing most immoderately. 

Ting, ting, ting ! went the prompter’s bell at eight 
o’clock precisely, and dash went the orchestra into the 
overture to “ The Men of Prometheus.” The pianoforte 
player hammered away with laudable perseverance ; and 
the violoncello, which struck in at intervals, “ sounded 
very well, considering.” The unfortunate individual, 
however, who had undertaken to play the flute accom- 
paniment “at sight,” found, from fatal experience, the 
perfect truth of the old adage, “ out of sight, out of 
mind ; ” for being very near-sighted, and being placed at 
a considerable distance from his music-book, all he had 
an opportunity of doing was to play a bar now and then 
in the wrong place, and put the other performers out. 
It is, however, but justice to Mr. Brown to say that he 
did this to admiration. The overture, in fact, was not 
unlike a race between the different instruments ; the 
piano came in first by several bars, and the violoncello 
next, quite distancing the poor flute ; for the deaf gentle- 
man too-too'd away, quite unconscious that he was at all 
wrong, until apprised by the applause of the audience, 
that the overture was concluded. A considerable bustle 


MRS. JOSEPH PORTER. 


239 


and shuffling of feet was then heard upon the stage, 
accompanied by whispers of “ Here’s a pretty go ! — 
what’s to be done ? ” &c. The audience applauded 
again, by way of raising the spirits of the performers ; 
and then Mr. Sempronius desired the prompter, in a 
very audible voice, to “ clear tlie stage, and ring up.” 

Ting, ting, ting ! went the bell again. Everybody sat 
down ; the curtain shook ; rose sufficiently high to dis- 
play several pair of yellow boots paddling about ; and 
there remained. 

Ting, ting, ting ! went the bell again. The ciutain 
was violently convulsed, but rose no higher ; the audi- 
ence tittered ; Mrs. Porter looked at Uncle Tom ; Uncle 
Tom looked at everybody, rubbing his hands, and laugh- 
ing with perfect rapture. After as much ringing with 
the little bell as a muffin-boy would make in going down 
a tolerably long street, and a vast deal of whispering, 
hammering, and calling for nails and cord, the curtain at 
length rose, and discovered Mr. Sempronius Gattleton, 
solus^ and decked for Othello. After three distinct rounds 
of applause, during which Mr. Sempronius applied his 
right hand to his left breast, and bowed in the most 
approved manner, the manager advanced, and said : 

“ Ladies and Gentlemen — I assure you it is with sin- 
cere regret, that I regret to be compelled to inform you, 
that lago who was to have played Mr. Wilson — 1 beg 
your pardon. Ladies and Gentlemen, but I am naturally 
somewhat agitated (applause) — I mean, Mr. Wilson, 
who was to have played lago, is — that is, has been — 
or, in other words. Ladies and Gentlemen, the fact is, 
that I ha\e just received a note, in which I am informed 
that lago is unavoidably detained at the Post-office this 
evening. Under these circumstances, I trust — a — a — 


340 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


amateur performance — a — another gentleman under- 
taken to read the part — requests indulgence for a short 
time — (jourtesy and kindness of a British audience.” 
Overwhelming applause. Exit Mr. Sempronius Gattle- 
ton, and curtain falls. 

The audience were, of course, exceedingly good- 
humored ; the whole business was a joke ; and accord- 
ingly they waited for an hour with the utmost patience, 
being enlivened by an interlude of rout-cakes and lemon- 
ade. It appeared by Mr. Sempronius’s subsequent ex- 
planation, that the delay would not have been so great, 
had it not so happened that when the substitute lago had 
finished dressing, and just as the play was on the point 
of commencing, the original lago unexpectedly arrived. 
The former was therefore compelled to undress, and the 
latter to dress for his part; which as he found some 
difficulty in getting into his clothes, occupied no incon- 
siderable time. At last, the tragedy began in real ear- 
nest. It went off well enough, until the third scene of 
the first act, in which Othello addresses the Senate : the 
only remarkable circumstance being, that as lago could 
not get on any of the stage-boots, in consequence of his 
feet being violently swelled with the heat and excite- 
ment, he was under the necessity of playing the part in 
a pair of Wellingtons, which contrasted rather oddly 
with his richly embroidered pantaloons. When Qthello 
started with his address to the Senate (whose dignity 
was represented by the Duke, a carpenter, two men 
engaged on the recommendation of the gardener, and a 
boy), Mrs. Porter found the opportunity she so anxiously 
Bought. 

Mr. Sempronius proceeded : 


MRS. JOSEPH PORTER. 


241 


** ‘ Most potent, grave, and reverend signiors. 

My very noble and approv’d good masters. 

That I have ta’en away this old man’s daughter, 

It is most true ; — rude am I in my speech — 

Is that right ? ” whispered Mrs. Porter to Unde 
Tom. 

« No.” 

“ Tell him so, then.” 

I will! Sem ! ” called out Uncle Tom, “ that’s wrong, 
my boy.” 

“ What’s wrong. Uncle ? ” demanded Othello^ quite for- 
getting the dignity of his situation. 

“ You’ve left out something. ‘ True I have mar- 
ried— - • 

“ Oh, ah ! ” said Mr. Sempronius, endeavoring to hide 
his confusion as much and as ineffectually as the au- 
dience attempted to conceal their half-suppressed titter- 
ing, by coughing with extraordinary violence — 

“ ‘ true I have married her ; — 

The very head and front of my offending 
Hath this extent; no more.’ 

(Aside) Why don’t you prompt, father ? ” 

“ Because I’ve mislaid my spectacles,” said poor Mr. 
Gattleton, almost dead with the heat and bustle. 

“ There, now it’s ‘ rude am I,’ ” said Uncle Tom. 

“ Yes, I know it is,” returned the unfortunate man- 
ager, proceeding with his part. 

It would be useless and tiresome to quote the numbei 
of instances in which Uncle Tom, now completely in his 
element, and instigated by the mischievous Mrs. Porter, 
corrected the mistakes of the performers ; suffice it to 
say, that having mounted his hobby, nothing could in- 
duce him to dismount ; so, during the whole remainder 

VOL. II. 16 


242 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


of the play, he performed a kinc|^ of running accompani- 
ment, by muttering everybody’s part as it was being 
delivered, in an undertone. The audience were highly 
amused, Mrs. Porter delighted, the performers embar- 
rassed ; Uncle Tom never was better pleased in all his 
life; and Uncle Tom’s nephews and nieces had never, 
although the declared heirs to his large property, so 
heartily wished him gathered to his fathers as on that 
memorable occasion. 

Several other minor causes, too, united to damp the 
ardor of the dramatis personce. None of the performers 
could walk in their tights, or move their arms in their 
jackets ; the pantaloons were too small, the boots too 
large, ancT the swords of all shapes and sizes. Mr. 
Evans, naturally too tall for the scenery, wore a black 
velvet hat with immense white plumes, the glory of 
which was lost in “ the flies ; ” and the only other incon- 
venience of which was, that when it was off his head he 
could not put it on, and when it was on he could not 
take it off. Notwithstanding all his practice, too, he fell 
with his head and shoulders as neatly through one of the 
side scenes, as a harlequin would jump through a panel 
in a Christmas pantomime. The pianoforte player, over- 
powered by the extreme heat of the room, fainted away 
at the commencement of the entertainments, leaving the 
music of “ Masaniello” to the flute and violoncello. The 
orchestra complained that Mr. Harleigh put them out, 
and Mr. Harleigh declared that the orchestra prevented 
his singing a note. The fishermen, who were hired for 
the occasion, revolted to the very life, positively refusing 
to play without an increased allowance of spirits ; and, 
dieir demand being complied with, getting drunk in the 
eruption scene as naturally as possible. The red fire, 


MRS. JOSEPH PORTER. 


248 


which was burnt at the conclusion of the second act, not 
only nearly suffocated the audience, but nearly set the 
house on fire into the bargain ; and, as it was, the re- 
mainder of the piece was acted in a thick fog. 

In short, the whole affair was, as Mrs. Joseph Porter 
triumphantly told everybody, “ a complete failure.” The 
audience went home at four o’clock in the morning, ex- 
hausted with laughter, suffering from severe headaches, 
and smelling terribly of brimstone and gunpowder. The 
Messrs. Gattleton, senior and junior, retired to rest, with 
the vague idea of emigrating to Swan River early in the 
ensuing week. 

Rose Villa has once again resumed its wonted appear- 
ance ; the dining-room furniture has been replaced ; the 
tables are as nicely polished as formerly ; the horsehair 
chairs are ranged against the wall, as regularly as ever ; 
Venetian blinds have been fitted to every window in the 
house to intercept the prying gaze of Mrs. Joseph Porter. 
The subject of theatricals is never mentioned in the Gat- 
tletbn family, unless, indeed, by Uncle Tom, who cannot 
refrain from sometimes expressing his surprise and re- 
gret at finding that his nephews and nieces appear to 
have lost the relish they once possessed for the beauties 
of Shakspeare, and quotations from the works of that 
immortal bard. 


244 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


CHAPTER X. 

A. PASSAGE IN THE LIFE OF MR. WATKINS TOTILB. 

CHAPTER THE FIRST. 

Matrimony is proverbially a serious undertaking. 
Like an overweening predilection for brandy-and-water, 
it is a misfortune into which a man easily falls, and from 
which he finds it remarkably difficult to extricate himself. 
It is of no use telling a man who is timorous on these 
points, that it is but one plunge, and all is over. They 
say the same thing at the Old Bailey, and the unfortu* 
nate victims derive as much comfort from the assurance 
in the one case as in the other. 

Mr. Watkins Tottle was a rather uncommon compound 
of strong uxorious inclinations, and an unparalleled 
degree of anti-connubial timidity. He was about fifty 
years of age ; stood four feet six inches* and three- 
quarters in his socks — for he never stood in stocking at 
aU — plump, clean, and rosy. He looked something like 
a vignette to one of Richardson’s novels, and had a clean- 
cravatish formality of manner, and kitchen-pokerness of 
carriage, which Sir Charles Grandison himself might 
have envied. He lived on an annuity, which was well 
adapted to the individual who received it, in one respect 
— it was rather small. He received it in periodical pay- 
ments on every alternate Monday ; but he ran himself out, 
about a day after the expiration of the first week, as 
regularly as an eight-day clock ; and then, to make the 


MR. WATI^INS TOTTLE. 


245 


comparison complete, his landlady wound him up, and he 
went on with a regular tick. 

Mr. Watkins Tottle had long lived in a state of single 
blessedness, as bachelors say, or single cursedness, as 
spinsters think ; but the idea of matrimony had never 
ceased to haunt Jiim. Wrapt in profound reveries on 
this never-failing theme, fancy transformed his small 
parlor in Cecil Street, Strand, into a neat house in the 
suburbs ; the half - hundredweight of coals under the 
kitchen-stairs suddenly sprang up into three tons of 
the best Walls End ; his small French bedstead was 
converted into a regular matrimonial four-poster ; and in 
the empty chair on the opposite side of the fireplace, 
imagination seated a beautiful young lady, with a very 
little independence or will of her own, and a very large 
independence under a will of her father’s. 

“ Who’s there?” inquired Mr. Watkins Tottle, as a 
gentle tap at his room-door disturbed these meditations 
one evening. 

“ Tottle, my dear fellow, how do you do ? ” said a 
short elderly gentleman with a grufiish voice, bursting 
into the room, and replying to the question by asking 
another. 

“ Told you I should drop in some evening,” said the 
short gentleman, as he delivered his hat into Tottle’s 
hand, after a little struggling and dodging. 

“ Delighted to see you, I’m sure,” said Mr. Watkins 
Tottle, wishing internally that his visitor had “ dropped 
in ” to the Thames at the bottom of the street, instead 
of dropping into his parlor. The fortnight was nearly 
ip, and Watkins was hard up. 

“ How is Mrs. Gabriel Parsons ? ” inquired Tottle. 

“ Quite well, thank you,” replied Mr. Gabriel Parsons, 


246 


SKETCHES* BY BOZ. 


for that was the name the short gentleman revelled 
•Here there was a pause ; the short gentleman looked at 
the left hob of the fireplace ; Mr. Watkins Tottle stared 
vacancy out of countenance. 

“ Quite well,” repeated the short gentleman, when five 
minutes had expired. “ I may say remarkably well.” 
And he rubbed the palms of his hands as hard as if he 
were going to strike a light by friction. 

“ What will you take ? ” inquired Tottle, with the des- 
perate suddenness of a man who knew that unless the 
visitor took his leave, he stood very little chance of tak- 
ing anything else. 

“ Oh, I don’t know. — Have you any whiskey ? ” 

“ Why,” replied Tottle, very slowly, for all this was 
gaining time, “ I had some capital, and 'remarkably 
strong whiskey last week ; but it’s all gone — and there- 
fore its strength — ” 

“ Is much beyond proof ; or, in other words, impossible 
to be proved,” said the short gentleman ; and he laughed 
very heartily, and seemed quite glad the whiskey had 
been drunk. Mr. Tottle smiled — but it was the smile 
of despair. When Mr. Gabriel Parsons had done laugh- 
ing, he delicately insinuated that, in the absence of whis- 
key, he would not be averse to brandy. And Mr. 
Watkins Tottle, lighting a flat candle very ostenta- 
tiously ; and displaying an immense key, which belonged 
to the street-door, but which, for the sake of appearances, 
occasionally did duty in an imaginary wine-cellar ; left 
the room to entreat his landlady to charge their glasses, 
and charge them in the bill. The application was suc- 
cessful ; the spirits were speedily called — not from the 
vasty deep, but the adjacent wine-vaults. The two 
short gentlemen mixed their grog ; and then sat cosily 


MR^ WATKINS TOTTLE. 


247 


down before the fire — a pair of shorts, airing them- 
selves. 

“ Tottle,” said Mr. Gabriel Parsons, “ you know my 
way — off-hand, open, say what I mean, mean what I 
say, hate reserve, and can’t bear affectation. One, is a 
bad domino which only hides what good people have 
about ’em, without making the bad look better ; and the 
other is much about the same thing as pinking a white 
cotton stocking to make it look like a silk one. Now 
listen to what I’m going to say.” 

Here, the little gentleman paused, and took a long 
pull at his brandy-and- water. Mr. Watkins Tottle took 
a sip of his, stirred the fire, and assumed an air of pro- 
found attention. 

“ It’s of no use humming and ha’ing about the mat- 
ter,” resumed the short gentleman, — “ you want to get 
married.” 

“ Why,” replied Mr. Watkins Tottle, evasively ; for 
he trembled violently, and felt a sudden tingling through- 
out his" whole frame; “why — I should certainly — at 
least, I think I should like — ” 

“ Won’t do,” said the short gentleman. — “ Plain and 
free — or there’s an end of the matter. Do you want 
money ? ” 

“You know I do.” 

“You admire the sex?” 

“Ido.” 

“ And you’d like to be married ? ” 

“ Certainly.” 

“ Then you shall be. There’s an end of that.” Thun# 
Baying, Mr. Gabriel Parsons took a pinch of snuff, and 
mixed another glass. 

“ Let me entreat you to be more explanatory,” said 


248 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


Tottle. “ Really, as the party principally interested, I 
cannot consent to be disposed of, in this way.” 

“ ril tell you, replied Mr. Gabriel Parsons, warming 
with the subject, and the brandy-and-water. — ‘‘I know 
a lady — she’s stopping with my wife now — who’s just 
the thing for you. Well-educated; talks French; plays 
the piano ; knows a good deal about flowers and shells, 
and all that sort of thing ; and has five hundred a year, 
with an uncontrollable power of disposing of it, by her 
last will and testament.” 

“Pll pay my addresses to her,” said Mr. Watkins 
Tottle. “ She isn’t very young — is she ? ” 

“Not very; just the thing for you. — I’ve said that 
already.” 

“ What colored hair has the lady ? ” inquired Mr. 
Watkins Tottle. 

“ Egad, I hardly recollect,” replied Gabriel with cool 
ness. “ Perhaps I ought to have observed, at first, she 
wears a front.” 

“ A what ! ” ejaculated Tottle. 

“ One of those thing, with curls, along here,” said 
Parsons, drawing a straight line across his forehead, just 
over his eyes, in illustration of his meaning. “ I know 
the front’s black : I can’t speak quite positively about 
her own hair ; because, unless one walks behind her, and 
catches a glimpse of it under her bonnet, one seldom sees 
it ; but I should say that it was rather lighter than the 
front — a shade of a grayish tinge, perhaps.” 

Mr. Watkins Tottle looked as if he had certain mis- 
givings of mind. Mr. Gabriel Parsons perceived it, 
and thought it would be safe to begin the next attack 
without delay. 

“ Now, were you ever in love, Tottle ? ” he inquired. 


MR. WATIQNS TOTTLE. 


249 


Mr. Watkins Tottle blushed up to the eyes, and down 
to the chin, and exhibited a most extensive combination 
of colors as he confessed the soft impeachment. 

“ I suppose you popped the question, more than 
once, when you were a young — I beg your pardon — 
a younger — man,” said Parsons. 

“ Never in my life ! ” replied his friend, apparently in- 
dignant at being suspected of such an act. “ Never ! The 
fact is, that I entertain, as you know, peculiar opinions 
on these subjects. I am not afraid of ladies, young or 
old — far from it ; but, I think, that in compliance with 
the custom of the present day, they allow too much free- 
dom of speech and manner to marriageable men. Now, 
the fact is, that anything like this easy freedom I never 
could acquire ; and as I am always afraid' of going too 
far, I am generally, I dare say, considered formal and 
cold.” 

“I shouldn’t wonder if you were,” replied Parsons, 
gravely; “I shouldn’t wonder. However you’ll be all 
right in this case ; for the strictness and delicacy of this 
lady’s ideas greatly exceed your own. Lord bless you, 
why when she came to our house, there was an old por- 
trait of some man or other, with two large black staring 
eyes, hanging up in her bedroom ; she positively refused 
to go to bed there, till it was taken down, considering it 
decidedly wrong.” 

“ I think so, too,” said Mr. Watkins Tottle ; “ cer- 
tainly.” 

“ And then, the other night — I never laughed so 
much in my life,” resumed Mr. Gabriel Parsons ; “ I 
had driven home in an easterly wind, and caught a devil 
of a face-ache. Well ; as Fanny — that’s Mrs. Parsons, 
you know — and this friend of hers, and I, and Frank 


250 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


Ross, were playing a rubber, I said, jokingly, that whea 
I went to bed 1 should wrap my head in Fanny’s flannel 
petticoat. She instantly threw up her cards, and left the 
room.” 

“ Quite right ! ” said Mr. Watkins Tottle, “ she could 
not possibly have behaved in a more dignified manner. 
What did you do ? ” 

“ Do ? — Frank took dummy ; and I won sixpence ? ” 

“ But, didn’t you apologize for hurting 'her feelings ? ” 

“ Devil a bit. Next morning at breakfast, we talked 
it over. She contended that any reference to a flannel 
petticoat was improper ; — men ought not to be supposed 
to know that such things were. I pleaded my coverture ; 
being a married man.” 

“ And what did the lady say to that ? ” inquired 
Tottle, deeply interested. 

“ Changed her ground, and said that Frank being a 
single man, its impropriety was obvious.” 

“ Noble-minded creature ! ” exclaimed the enraptured 
Tottle. 

“ Oh ! both F anny and I said, at once, that she was 
regularly cut out for you.” 

A gleam of placid satisfaction shone on the circular 
face of Mr. Watkins Tottle, as he heard the prophecy. 

“ There’s one tiling I can’t understand,” said Mr. 
Gabriel Parsons, as he rose to depart ; “ I cannot, for 
the life and soul of me imagine, how the deuce you’ll 
ever contrive to come together. 'Fhe lady would cer- 
tainly go into convulsions if the subject were mentioned.” 
Mr. Gabriel Parsons sat down again, and laughed until 
he was weak. Tottle owed him money, so he had a per- 
fect right to laugh at Tottle’s expense. 

Mr. Watkins Tottle feared, in his own mind, that this 


MR. WATKINS TOTTLE. 


251 


wras another characteristic which he had in common with 
this modern Lucretia. He, however, accepted the invi- 
tation to dine with the Parsonses on the next day but 
one, with great firmness ; and looked forward to the 
introduction, when again left alone, with tolerable com- 
posure. 

The sun that rose on the next day but one, had never 
beheld a sprucer personage on the outside of the Nor- 
wood stage, than Mr. Watkins Tottle ; and when the 
coach drew up before a card-board looking house with 
disguised chimneys, and a lawn like a large sheet of 
green letter-paper, he certainly had never lighted to his 
place of destination a gentleman who felt more uncom- 
fortable. 

The coach stopped, and Mr. Watkins Tottle jumped — 
we beg his pardon — alighted, with great dignity. “ All 
right ! ” said he, and away went the coach up the hill 
with that beautiful equanimity of pace for which “ short ” 
stages are generally remarkable. 

Mr. Watkins Tottle gave a faltering jerk to the han- 
dle of the garden-gate bell. He essayed a more ener- 
getic tug, and his previous nervousness was not at all 
diminished by hearing the bell ringing like a fire alarum. 

“ Is Mr. Parsons at home ? ” inquired Tottle of the 
man who opened the gate. He could hardly hear him- 
self speak, for the bell had not yet done tolling. 

“ Here I am,” shouted a voice on the lawn, — and 
there was Mr. Gabriel Parsons in a flannel jacket, imn- 
ning backwards and forwards, from a wicket to two hats 
piled on each other, and from the two hats to the wicket, 
in the most violent manner, while another gentleman 
with his coat off was getting down the area of the house, 
after a ball. When the gentleman withe nt the coat had 


252 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


found it — which he did in less than ten minutes — ht» 
ran back to the hats, and Gabriel Parsons pulled up. 
Then, the gentleman without the coat called out “ play,” 
very loudly, and bowled. Then, Mr. Gabriel Parsons 
knocked the ball several yards, and took another run. 
Then, the other gentleman aimed at the wicket, and 
didn’t hit it ; and Mr. Gabriel Parsons, having finished 
running on his own account, laid down the bat and ran 
after the ball, which went into a neighboring field. They 
called this cricket. 

“ Tottle, will you ‘go in ? ’ ” inquired Mr. Gabriel 
Parsons, as he approached him, wiping the perspiration 
off* his face. 

Mr. Watkins Tottle declined the offer, the bare idea 
of accepting which made him even warmer than his 
friend. 

“ Then we’ll go into the house, as it’s past four, and I 
shall have to wash my hands before dinner,” said Mr. 
Gabriel Parsons. “ Here, I hate ceremony, you know ! 
Timson, that’s Tottle — Tottle, that’s Timson ; bred for 
the church, which I fear will never be bread for him ; ” 
and he chuckled at the old joke. Mr. Timson bowed 
carelessly. Mr. Watkins Tottle bowed stiffly. Mr. 
Gabriel Parsons led the way to the house. He was a 
rich sugar-baker, who mistook rudeness for honesty, 
and abrupt bluntness for an open and candid man- 
lier ; many besides Gabriel mistake bluntness for sin- 
terity. 

Mrs. Gabriel Parsons received the visitors most gra- 
ciously on the steps, and preceded them to the drawing- 
room. On the sofa was seated a lady of very prim 
appearance, and i-emarkably inanimate. She was one 
of those persons at whose age it is impossible to make 


' MR. WATKINS TOTTLE. 


253 


any reasonable guess her features might have been 
remarkably pretty when she was younger, and they 
might always have presented the same appearance. 
Her complexion — with a slight trace of powder here 
and there — was as clear as that of a well-made wax 
doll, and her face as expressive. She was handsomely 
dressed, and was winding up a gold watch. 

“ Miss Lillerton, my dear, this is our friend Mr. Wat- 
kins Tottle ; a veiy old acquaintance, I assure you,” 
said Mrs. Parsons, presenting the Strephon of Cecil 
Street, Strand. The lady rose, and made a deep courte- 
sy ; Mr. Watkins Tottle made a bow*. 

“ Splendid, majestic creature ! ” thought Tottle. 

Mr. Timson advanced, and Mr. Watkins Tottle began 
to hate him. Men generally discover a rival, instinc- 
tively, and Mr. Watkins Tottle felt that his hate was 
deserved. 

“ May I beg,” said the reverend gentleman, — “ May 
I beg to call upon you. Miss Lillei’ton, for some trifling 
donation to my soup, coals, and blanket-distribution 
society ? ” 

“ Put my name down for two sovereigns, if you please,” 
responded Miss Lillerton. 

“ You are truly charitable, madam,” said the Rever- 
end Mr. Timson, “ and we know that charity will cover 
a multitude of sins. Let me beg you to understand that. 
I do not say this from the supposition that you have 
many sins which require palliation ; believe me when I 
vay that I never yet met any one who had fewer to 
fttone for than Miss Lillerton.” 

Something like a bad imitation of animation lighted 
up the lady’s face, as she acknowledged the compliment. 
Watkins Tottle incurred the sin of wishing that the 


254 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


ashes of the Reverend Charles Timson were quietly 
deposited in the churchyard of his curacy, wherever it 
might be. 

‘‘I’ll tell you what,” interrupted Parsons, who had 
just appeared with clean hands, and a black coat, “ it’s 
my private opinion, Timson, that your ‘ distribution so- 
ciety ’ is rather a humbug.” 

“ You are so severe,” replied Timson, with a Christian 
smile ; he disliked Parsons, but liked his dinners. 

“ So positively unjust ! ” said Miss Lillerton. 

“ Certainly,” observed Tottle. The lady looked up ; 
her eyes met those* of Mr. Watkins Tottle. She with- 
drew them in a sweet confusion, and Watkins Tottle did 
the same — the confusion was mutual. 

“ Why,” urged Mr. Parsons, pursuing his objections, 
“ what on earth is the use of giving a man coals who 
has nothing to cook, or giving him blankets when he 
hasn’t a bed, or giving him soup when he requires sub- 
stantial food ? — ‘ like sending them ruffles when want- 
ing a shirt.’ Why not give ’em a trifle of money, as I 
do, when I think they deserve it, and let them purchase 
what they think best ? Why ? — because your subscrib- 
ers wouldn’t see their names flourishing in print on the 
church-door — that’s the reason.” 

“ Really, Mr. Parsons, I hope you don’t mean to 
insinuate that I wish to see my name in print, on the 
church-door,” interrupted Miss Lillerton. 

' “I hope not,” said Mr. Watkins Tottle, putting in 
another word, and getting another glance. 

“ Certainly not,” replied Parsons. “ I dare say you 
wouldn’t mind seeing it in writing, though, in the church 
register — eh ? ” 

“ Register ! What register ? ” inquired the lady, 
gravely. 


MR. WATKINS TOTTLE. 


255 


“ Why, the register of marriages, to be sure,” replied 
Parsons, chuckling at the sally, and glancing at Tottle. 
Rlr. Watkins Tottle thought he should have fainted for 
shame, and it is quite impossible to imagine what effect 
the joke would have had upon the lady, if dinner had 
not been, at that moment, announced. Mr. Watkins 
Tottle, with an unprecedented effort of gallantry, offered 
the tip of his little finger ; Miss Lillerton accepted it 
gracefully, with maiden modesty ; and they proceeded 
in due state to the dinner-table, where they were soon 
deposited side by side. The room was very snug, the 
dinner very good, and the little party in spirits. The 
conversation became pretty general, and when Mr. Wat- 
kins Tottle had extracted one or two cold observations 
from his neighbor, and had taken wine with her, he 
began to acquire confidence rapidly. The cloth was 
removed ; Mrs. Gabriel Parsons drank four glasses of 
port on the plea of being a nurse just then ; and Miss 
Lillerton took about the same number of sips, on the 
plea of not wanting any at all. At length the ladies 
retired, to the great gratification of Mr. Gabriel Parsons, 
who had been coughing and frowning at his wife for half 
an hour previously — signals which Mrs. Parsons never 
happened to observe, until she had been pressed to take 
her ordinary quantum, which, to avoid giving trouble, 
slie generally did at once. 

“ What do you think of her ? ” inquired Mr. Gabriel 
Parsons of Mr. Watkins Tottle, in an undertone. 

“ I dote on her with enthusiasm already ! ” replied 
Mr. Watkins Tottle. 

“ Gentlemen, pray let us drink ‘ the ladies,’ ” said the 
Ueverend Mr. Timson. 

« The ladies ! ” said Mr. Watkins Tottle, emptying his 


256 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


glass. In the fulness of his confidence, he felt as if he 
could make love to a dozen ladies, oflf-hand. 

“ J ” said Mr. Gabriel Parsons, ‘‘ I remember when 
I was a young man — fill yoiir glass, Timson.” 

“ I have this moment emptied it.” 

“ Then fill again.” 

“ I will,” said Timson, suiting the action to the Tvord. 

“ I remember,” resumed Mr. Gabriel Parsons, “ when 
I was a younger man, with what a strange compound of 
feelings I used to drink that toast, and how I used to 
think every woman was an angel.” 

“ Was that before you were married ? ” mildly inquired 
Mr. Watkins Tottle. 

“ Oh ! certainly,” replied Mr. Gabriel Parsons, “ I 
have never thought so since ; and a precious milksop I 
must have been, ever to have thought so at all. But, 
you know, I manded Fanny under the oddest and most 
ridiculous circumstances possible.” 

“ What were they, if one may inquire ? ” asked Tim- 
son, who had heard the story, on an average, twice a 
week for the last six months. Mr. Watkins Tottle lis- 
tened attentively, in the hope of picking up some sug- 
gestion that might be useful to him in his new under- 
taking. 

“ I spent my wedding-night in a back-kitchen chim- 
ney,” said Parsons, by way of a beginning. 

“ In a back-kitchen chimuey ! ” ejaculated Watkins 
Tottle. “ How dreadful ! ” 

“ Yes, it wasn’t very plea.^ant,” replied the small host. 

The fact is, Fanny.’s father and mother liked me well 
enough as an individual, but had a decided objection to 
my becoming a husband. You see, I hadn’t any money 
in those days, and they had ; and so they wanted Fanny 


MR. WATKINS TOTTLE. 


267 


to pick up somebody else. However, we"^ managed to 
discover the state of each other’s affections somehow. I 
used to meet her, at some mutual friends’ parties ; at first 
we danced together, and talked, and flirted, and all that 
sort of thing ; then, I used to like nothing so well as sit- 
ting by her side — we didn’t talk so much then, but I 
remember I used to have a great notion of looking at 
her out of the extreme corner of my left eye — and then 
I got very miserable and sentimental, and began to write 
verses, and use Macassar oil. At last I couldn’t bear it 
any longer, and after I had walked up and down the 
sunny side of Oxford Street in tight boots for a week — 
and a devilish hot summer it was too — in the hope of 
meeting her, I sat down and wrote a letter, and begged 
her to manage to see me clandestinely, for I wanted to 
hear her decision from her own mouth. I said I had dis- 
covered, to my perfect satisfaction, that I couldn’t live 
without her, and that if she didn’t have me, I had made 
up my mind to take prussic acid, or take to diinking, or 
emigrate, so as to take myself off in some way or other. 
Well, I borrowed a pound, and bribed the housemaid to 
give her the note, which she did.” 

“ And what was the reply ? ” inquired Timson, who 
had found, before, that to encourage the repetition of old 
stories is to get a general invitation. 

« Oh, the usual one ! Fanny expressed herself very 
miserable ; hinted at the possibility of an early grave ; 
said that nothing should induce her to swerve fi’om the 
duty she owed her parents ; implored me to forget her, 
and find out somebody more deserving, and all that sort 
v>f thing. She said she could, on no account, think of 
meeting me unknown to her pa and ma ; and entreated 
me, as she should be in a particular part of Kensington 
17 


von. II. 


258 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


Gardens at eleven o’clock next morning, not to attempt 
to meet her there.” 

“ You didn’t go, of course ? ” said Watkins Tottle. 

“ Didn’t I? — Of course I did. There she was, with 
the identical housemaid in perspective, in order that there 
might be no interruption. We walked about, for a 
couple of hours ; made ourselves delightfully miserable ; 
and were regularly engaged. Then, we began to ‘ cor- 
respond’ — that is to say, we used to exchange about 
four letters a day ; what we used to say in ’em I can’t 
imagine. And I used to have an interview, in the 
kitchen, or the cellar, or some such place, every evening. 
Well, things went on in this way for some time ; and we 
got fonder of each other every day. At last, as our love 
was raised to such a pitch, and as my salary had been 
raised too, shortly before, we determined on a secret mar- 
riage. Fanny arranged to sleep at a friend’s on the pre- 
vious night ; we were to be married early in the morn- 
ing ; and then we were to return to her home and be 
pathetic. She was to fall at the old gentleman’s feet, 
and bathe his boots with her tears ; and I was to hug 
the old lady and call her ‘ mother,’ and use my pocket- 
handkerchief as much as possible. Married we were, 
the next morning ; two girls — friends of Fanny’s — 
acting as bridesmaids ; and a man, who was hired for 
five shillings and a pint of porter, ofiiciating as father. 
Now, the old lady unfortunately put off her return from 
Ramsgate, where she had been paying a visit, until the 
next morning : and as we placed great reliance on her, 
we agreed to postpone our confession for four-and-twenty 
hours. My newly made wife returned home, and I spent 
my wedding-day in strolling about Hampstead Heath, 
and execrating my father-in-law. Of course, I went to 


MR. WATKINS TOTTLE. 


259 


comfort my dear little wife at night, as much as I could, 
with the assurance that our troubles would soon be over. 
I opened the garden-gate, of which I had a key, and was 
shown by the servant to our old place of meeting — a 
back-kitchen, with a stone floor and a dresser; upon 
which, in the absence of chairs, we used to sit and make 
love.” 

“ Make love upon a kitchen-dresser ? ” interrupted Mr. 
Watkins Tottle, whose ideas of decorum were greatly 
outraged. 

“ Ah ! On a kitchen-dresser ! ” replied Parsons. 
“And let me tell you, old fellow, that, if you were 
really over head-and-ears in love, and had no other place 
to make love in, you’d be devilish glad to avail yourself 
of such an opportunity. However, let me see ; — where 
was I ? ” 

“ On the dresser,” suggested Timson. 

“ Oh — ah ! Well, here I found poor Fanny, quite 
disconsolate and uncomfortable. The old boy had been 
very cross all day, which made her feel still more lonely ; 
and she was quite out of spirits. So, I put a good face 
on the matter, and laughed it off, and said we should 
enjoy the pleasures of a matrimonial life more, by con- 
trast ; and, at length, poor Fanny brightened up a little. 
I stopped there, till about eleven o’clock, and, just as 1 
was taking my leave for the fourteenth time, the girl 
came running down the stairs, without her shoes, in a 
great fright, to tell us that the old villain — Heaven for- 
give me for calling him so, for he is dead and gone now ! 
— prompted I suppose by the prince of darkness, was 
coming down to draw his own beer for supper — a thing 
pe had not done before, for six months, to my certain 
knowledge ; for the cask stood in that very back-kitchen. 


260 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


If he discovered me there, explanation would have been 
out of the question ; for he was so outrageously violent, 
when at all excited, that he never would have listened to 
me. There was only one thing to be done. The chim- 
ney was a very wide one ; it had been originally built 
for an oven ; went up perpendicularly for a few feet, and 
then shot backward and formed a sort of small cavern. 
My hopes and fortune — the means of our joint existence 
almost — were at stake. I scrambled in, like a squirrel ; 
coiled myself up in this recess; and, as Fanny and the 
girl replaced the deal chimney board, I could see the 
light of the candle which my unconscious father-in-law 
carried in his hand. I heard him draAV the beer ; and I 
never heard beer run so slowly. He was just leaving 
the kitchen, and I was preparing to descend, when down 
came the infernal chimney board with a tremendous 
crash. He stopped, and put down the candle and the 
jug of beer on the dresser ; he was a nervous old fellow, 
and -any unexpected noise annoyed him. He coolly ob- 
served that the fireplace was never used, and sending the 
frightened servant into the next kitchen for a hammer 
and nails, actually nailed up the board, and locked the 
door on the outside. So, there was I, on my wedding- 
night, in the light kerseymere trousers, fancy waistcoat, 
and blue coat, that I had been married in in the morn- 
ing, in a back-kitchen chimney, the bottom of which was 
nailed up, and the top of which had been formerly raised 
some fifteen feet, to prevent the smoke from annoying 
the neighbors. And there,” added Mr*. Gabriel Parsons, 
as he passed the bottle, “ there I remained till half-past 
seven the next morning, when the housemaid’s sweet- 
heart, who was a carpenter, uushelled me. The old dog 
had nailed me up so securely, that, to this very hour, I 


MR. WATKINS TOTTLE. 


261 


finnly believe that no one but a carpenter could ever 
have got me out.” 

“ And what did Mrs. Parsons’s father say, when he 
found you were married ? ” inquired Watkins Tottle, 
who, although he never saw a joke, was not satisfied 
until he heard a story to the very end. 

“ Why, the affair of the chimney so tickled his fancy, 
that he pardoned us off*-hand, and allowed us something 
to live on till he went the way of all flesh. I spent the 
next night in his second-floor front, much more comfort- 
ably than I had spent the preceding one ; for, as you will 
probably guess — ” 

“ Please sir, missis has made tea,” said a middle-aged 
female servant, bobbing into the room. 

“ That’s the very housemaid that figures in my story,” 
said Mr. Gabriel Parsons. “ She went into Fanny’s 
service when we were first mamed, and has been with us 
ever since ; but I don’t think she has felt one atom of 
respect for me since the morning she saw me released, 
when she went into violent hysterics, to which she has 
been subject ever since. Now, shall we join the 
ladies ? ” 

“ If you please,” said Mr. Watkins Tottle. 

“ By all means,” added the obsequious Mr. Timson ; 
and the trio made for the drawing-room accordingly. 

Tea being concluded, and the toast and cups having 
been duly handed, and occasionally upset, by Mr. Wat- 
kins Tottle, a rubber was proposed. They cut for part- 
ners — Mr. and Mrs. Parsons ; and Mr. Watkins Tottle 
and Miss Lillerton. Mr. Timson having conscientious 
scruples on the subject of card-playing, drank brandy- 
and-water, and kept up a running spar with Mr. Watkins 
Tottle. The evening went off well ; Mr. Watkins Tottle 


262 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


was in high spirits, having some reason to be gratified 
with his reception by Miss Lillerton ; and before he left, 
a small party was made up to visit the Beulah Spa on 
the following Saturday. 

“It’s all right, I think,” said Mr. Gabriel Parsons 
to Mr. Watkins Tottle, as he opened the garden gate for 
him. 

“ I hope so,” he replied, squeezing his friend’s hand. 

“ You’ll be down by the first coach on Saturday,” said 
Mr. Gabriel Parsons. 

“ Certainly,” replied Mr. Watkins Tottle. “ Undoubt- 
edly.” 

But fortune had decreed that Mr. Watkins Tottle 
should not be down by the first coach on Saturday. 
His adventures on that day, however, and the success 
of his wooing, are subjects for another chapter. 


CHAPTER THE SECOND. 

“ The first coach has not come in yet, has it, Tom ? ” 
inquired Mr. Gabriel Parsons, as he very complacently 
paced up and down the fourteen feet of gravel which 
bordered the “lawn,” on the Saturday morning which 
had been fixed upon for the Beulah Spa jaunt. 

“ No, sir ; I haven’t seen it,” replied a gardener in a 
blue apron, who let himself out to do the ornamental for 
half a crown a day and his “ keep.” 

“ Time Tottle was down,” said Mr. Gabriel Parsons, 
ruminating — “Oh, here he is, no doubt,” added Gabriel, 
as a cab drove rapidly up the hill ; and he buttoned his 


MR. WATKINS TOTTLE. 


dressing-gown, and opened the gate to receive the ex- 
pected visitor. The cab stopped, and out jumped a man 
in a coarse Petersham great-coat, whity-brown necker- 
chief, faded black suit, gamboge-colored top-boots, and 
one of those large - crowned hats formerly seldom met 
with, but now very generally patronized by gentlemen 
and costermongers. 4 

“ Mr. Parsons ? ” said the man, looking at the super- 
scription of a note he held in his hand, and a'ddressing 
Gabriel with an inquiring air. 

“ My name is Parsons,” responded the sugar-baker.^ 

“ I’ve brought this here note,” replied the individual 
in the painted tops, in a hoarse whisper ; “ I’ve brought 
this here note from a gen’lm’n as come to our house this 
mornin’.” 

“ I expected the gentleman at my house,” said Par- 
sons, as he broke the seal, which bore the impres- 
sion of her majesty’s profile as it is seen on a six- 
pence. 

“ I’ve no doubt the gen’lm’n would ha’ been here,” 
replied the stranger, “ if he hadn’t happened to call at 
our house first ; but we never trusts no gen’lm’n furder 
nor we can see him — no mistake about that there ” — 
added the unknown, with a facetious grin ; “ beg yer 
pardon, sir, no offence meant, only — once in, and I 
wish you may — catch the idea, sir ? ” 

Mr. Gabriel Parsons was not remarkable for catching 
anything suddenly, but a cold. He therefore only be- 
stowed a glance of profound astonishment on his myste- 
rious companion, and proceeded to unfold the note of 
which he had been the bearer. Once opened, and (he 
idea was caught with very little difiiculty. Mr. Watkins 
Pottle had been suddenly arrested for 33^. IO 5 . 4c?., and 


264 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


dated his communication from a lock - up house in the 
vicinity of Chancery Lane. 

“ Unfortunate affair, this ! ” said Parsons, refolding the 
note. 

“ Oh ! nothin’ ven you’re used to it,” coolly observed 
the man in the Petersham. 

“ Tom ! ” exclaime^l Parsons, after a few minutes’ 
consideration, “ just put the horse in, will you ? — Tell 
the gentleman that I shall be there almost as soon as 
you are,” he continued, addressing the sheriff - officer’s 
Mwcury. 

“ Weriy well,” replied that important functionary ; 
adding, in a confidential manner, “ I’d adwise the gen- 
’Im’n’s friends to settle. You see it’s a mere trifle ; and, 
unless the gen’lm’n means to go up afore the court, it’s 
hardly worth while waiting for detainers, you know. 
Our governor’s wide awake, he is. I’ll never say nothin’ 
agin him, nor no man ; but he knows what’s o’clock, he 
does, uncommon.” Having delivered this eloquent, and, 
to Parsons, particularly intelligible harangue, the mean- 
ing of which was eked out by divers nods and winks, 
the gentleman in the boots reseated himself in the cab, 
which went rapidly off and was soon out of sight. Mr. 
Gabriel Parsons continued to pace up and down the 
pathway for some minutes, apparently absorbed in deep 
meditation. The result of his cogitations seemied to be 
perfectly satisfactory to himself, for he ran briskly into 
the house ; said that business had suddenly summoned 
him to town ; that he had desired the messenger to in- 
form Mr. Watkins Tottle of the fact ; and that they 
wohld return together to dinner. He then hastily 
equipped himself for a drive, and mounting his gig, was 
soon on his way to the esUxblishment of Mr. Solomon 


MR. WATKINS TOTTLE. 


266 


Jacobs, situate (as Mr. Watkins Tottle had informed 
him) in Cursitor Street, Chancery Lane. 

When a man is in a violent hurry to get on, and has 
a specific object in view, the attainment of which de- 
pends on the completion of his journey, the difficulties 
which interpose themselves in his way appear not only 
to be innumerable, but to have been called into existence 
especially for the occasion. The remark is by no means 
a new one, and Mr. Gabriel Parsons had practical and 
painful experience of its justice in the course of his 
drive. There are three classes of animated objects 
which prevent your driving with any degree of comfort 
or celerity through streets which are but little frequented 
— they are pigs, children, and old women. On the 
occasion we are describing, the pigs were luxuriating on 
cabbage-stalks ; and the shuttlecocks fluttered from the 
little deal battledoors, and the -children played in the 
road ; and women, with a basket in one hand and the 
street-door key in the other, would cross just before the 
horse’s head, until Mr. Gabriel Parsons was perfectly 
savage with vexation, and quite hoarse with hoi-ing and 
imprecating. Then, when he got into Fleet Street, 
there was “ a stoppage,” in which people in vehicles 
have the satisfaction of remaining stationary for half 
an hour, and envying the slowest pedestrians ; and where 
policemen rush about, and seize hold of horses’ bridles, 
and back them into shop-windows, by way of clearing 
the road and preventing confusion. At length Mr. 
Gabriel Parsons turned into Chancery Lane, and hav- 
ing inquired for, and been directed to Cursitor Street 
(for it was a locality of which he was quite ignorant), 
ne soon found himself opposite the house of Mr. Solo- 
mon Jacobs. Confiding his horse and gig to the care 


266 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


of one of the fourteen boys who had followed him from 
the other side of Blackfriars Bridge on the chance of 
his requiring their services, Mr. Gabriel Parsons crossed 
the road and knocked at an inner door, the upper part 
of which was of glass, grated like the windows of this 
inviting mansion with iron bars — painted white to look 
comfortable. 

The knock was answered by a sallow-faced red-haired 
sulky boy, w'ho, after surveying Mr. Gabriel Parsons 
thi’ough the glass, applied a large key to an immense 
wooden excrescence, which was in reality a lock, but 
which, taken in conjunction with the iron nails with 
which the panels were studded, gave the door the ap- 
pearance of being subject to warts. 

“ I want to see Mr. Watkins Tottle,” said Parsons. 

“ It’s the gentleman that come in this morning, Jem,” 
screamed a voice from the top of the kitchen stairs, 
which belonged to a dirty woman, who had just brought 
her chin to a level with the passage-floor. “ The gen- 
tleman’s in the coffee-room.” 

“ Up-stairs, sir,” said the boy, just opening the door 
wide enough to let Parsons in without squeezing him, 
and double-locking it the moment he had made his way 
through the aperture — “ First floor — door on the 
left.” 

Mr. Gabriel Parsons, thus instructed, ascended the 
uncarpeted and ill-lighted staircase, and after giving 
several subdued taps at the before-mentioned “ door on 
the left,” which were rendered inaudible by the hum of 
voices within the room, and the hissing noise attendant 
on some frying operations which were carrying on below 
stairs, turned the handle, and entered the apartment. 
Being informed that the unfortunate object of his visit 


MR. WATKINS TOTTLE. 


267 


bad just gone up-stairs to write a letter, he had leisure 
to sit down and observe the scene before him. 

The room — which was a small, confined den — was 
partitioned off into boxes, like the common room of some 
inferior eating-house. The dirty fioor had evidently 
been as long a stranger to the scrubbing-brush as to 
carpet or floor-cloth; and the ceiling was completely 
blackened by the flare of the oil-lamp by which the 
room was lighted at night. The gray ashes on the 
edges of the tables, and the cigar ends which were plen- 
tifully scattered about the dusty grate, fully accounted 
for the intolerable smell of tobacco which pervaded the 
place ; and the empty glasses and half-saturated slices 
of lemon on the tables, together with the porter-pots 
beneath them, bore testimony to the frequent libations 
in which the individuals who honored Mr. Solomon 
Jacobs by a temporary residence in his house indulged. 
Over the mantel-shelf was a paltry looking-glass, extend- 
ing about half the width of the chimney piece ; but by 
way of counterpoise the ashes were confined by a rusty 
fender about twice as long as the hearth. 

From this cheerful room itself, the attention of Mr. 
Gabriel Parsons was naturally directed to its inmates. 
In one of the boxes two men were playing at cribbage 
with a very dirty pack of cards, some with blue, some 
with green, and some with red backs — selections from 
decayed packs. The cribbage board had been long ago 
formed on the table by some ingenious visitor with the 
assistance of a pocket-knife and a two-pronged fork, with 
which the necessary number of holes had been made in 
the table at proper distances for the reception of the 
wooden pegs. In another box a stout, hearty looking 
man, of about forty, was eating some diimer which his 


268 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


wife — an equally comfortable-looking personage — had 
brought him in a basket ! and in a third, a genteel-look- 
ing young man was talking earnestly, and in a low tone, 
to a young female, whose face was concealed by a thick 
veil, but whom Mr. Gabriel Parsons immediately set 
down in his own mind as the debtor’s wife. A young 
fellow of vulgar manners, dressed in the very extreme 
of the prevailing fashion, was pacing up and down the 
room, with a lighted cigar in his mouth, and his hands 
in his pockets, ever and anon puffing forth volumes of 
smoke, and occasionally applying, with much apparent 
relish, to a pint pot, the contents of which were “ dull- 
ing ” on the hob. 

“ Fourpence more, by gum ! ” exclaimed one of the 
cribbage-players, lighting a pipe, and addressing his 
adversary at the close of the game ; “ one ’ud think 
you’d got luck in a pepper-cruet, and shook it out when 
you wanted it.” 

“ Well, that a’n’t a bad un,” replied the other, who 
was a horse-dealer from Islington. 

“ No ; I’m blessed if it is,” interposed the jolly looking 
fellow, who, having finished his dinner, was drinking out 
of the same glass as his wife, in truly conjugal harmony, 
some hot gin-and-water. The faithful partner of his 
cares had brought a plentiful supply of the anti-temper- 
ance fluid in a large flat stone bottle, which looked like a 
half-gallon jar that had been successfully tapped for the 
dropsy. “ You’re a rum chap, you are, Mr. Walker — 
will you dip your beak into this, sir ? ” 

“ Thank’ee, sir,” replied Mr. Walker, leaving his box, 
and advancing to the other to accept the proffered glass. 

Here’s your health, sir, and your good ’ooman’s here. 
Gentlemen all — yours, and better luck still. Well, Mr. 


MR. WATKINS TOTTLE. 


269 


Willis,” continued the facetious prisoner, addressing the 
young man with the cigar, “you seem rather down to- 
day — floored, as one may say. What’s the matter, sir ? 
Never say die you know.” 

“ Oh ! I’m all right,” replied the smoker. “ I shall bo 
bailed out to-morrow.” 

“ Shall you, though ? ” inquired the other. “ Damme, 
I wish I could say the same. I am as regularly over 
head and eai*s as the Royal George, and stand about as 
much chance of being hailed out. Ha ! ha ! ha ! ” 

“ Why,” said the young man, stopping short, and 
speaking in a very loud key, “ look at me. What d’ye 
think I’ve stopped here two days for?” 

“’Cause you couldn’t get out, I suppose,” interrupted 
Mr. Walker, winking to the company. “ Not that 
you’re exactly obliged to stop here, only you can’t 
help it. No compulsion, you know, only you must 
— eh ? ” 

“ A’n’t he a rum un,” inquired the delighted individ- 
ual, who had offered the gin-and-water, of his wife. 

“ Oh, he just is ! ” replied the lady, who was quite 
overcome by these flashes of imagination. 

“ Why, my case,” frowned the victim, throwing the 
end of his cigar into the fire, and illustrating his argu- 
ment by knocking the bottom of the pot on the table, at 
intervals, — “ my case is a very singular one. My fa- 
ther s a man of large property, and I am his son.” 

“ That’s a very strange circumstance ! ” interrupted 
the jocose Mr. Walker, en passant. 

« — I am his son, and have received a liberal educa- 
tion. I don’t owe no man nothing — not the value of a 
mrthing, but I was induced, you see, to put my name to 
oome bills for a friend — bills to a large amount, I may 


270 


SKE'i;CHES BY BOZ. 


Bay a very large amount, for which I didn’t receive no 
consideration. What’s the consequence ? ” 

“ Why, I suppose the bills went out, and you came in. 
The acceptances weren’t taken up, and you were, eh ? ” 
inquired Walker. 

“To be sure,” replied the liberally educated young 
gentleman. “ To be sure ; and so here I am, locked up 
for a matter of twelve hundred pound.” 

“ Why don’t you ask your old governor to stump up ? ” 
inquired Walker, with a somewhat sceptical air. 

“ Oh ! bless you, he’d never do it,” replied the other, 
in a tone of expostulation — “ Never ! ” 

“ Well, it is very odd to — be — sure,” interposed the 
owner of the flat bottle, mixing another glass, “ but I’ve 
been in difficulties, as one may say, now for thirty year. 
I went to pieces when I was in a milk-walk, thirty year 
ago ; arterwards, when I was a fruiterer, and kept a 
spring wan ; and arter that again in the coal and ’tatur 
line — but all that time I never see a youngish chap 
come into a place of this kind, who wasn’t going out 
again directly, and who hadn’t been arrested on bills 
which he’d given a friend and for which he’d received 
nothing whatsomever — not a fraction.” 

“ Oh ! it’s always the cry,” said Walker. “ I can’t see 
the use on it ; that’s what makes me so wild. Why, I 
should have a much better opinion of an individual, if 
he’d say at once in an honorable and gentlemanly man- 
ner as he’d done everybody he possibly could.” 

“Ay, to be sure,” interposed the horse-dealer, with 
whose notions of bargain and sale the axiom perfectly 
coincided, “ so should 1.” 

The young gentleman, who had given rise to these ob- 
servations, was on the point of offering a rather angiy 


MR. WATKINS TOTTLE. 


271 


reply to these sneers, but the rising of the young man 
before noticed, and of the female who had been sitting 
by him, to leave the room, interrupted the conversation. 
She had been weeping bitterly, and the noxious atmos- 
phere of the room acting upon her excited feelings and 
delicate frame, rendered the support of her companion 
necessary as they quitted it together. 

There was an air of superiority about them both, and 
something in their appearance so unusual in such a place, 
that a respectful silence was observed until the whirr — 
r — hang of the spring door announced that they were 
out of hearing. It was broken by the wife of the ex- 
fruiterer. 

“ Poor creetur ! ” said she, quenching a sigh in a rivu- 
let of gin-and-water. ‘‘ She’s very young.” 

“ She’s a nice-looking ’ooman too,” added the horse- 
dealer. 

“What’s he in for, Ikey?” inquired Walker, of an 
individual who was spreading a cloth with numerous 
blotches of mustard upon it, on one of the tables, and 
whom Mr. Gabriel Parsons had no difficulty in recog- 
nizing as the man who had called upon him in the morn- 
ing. 

“ Vy,” responded the factotum, “ it’s one of the rum- 
miest rigs you ever heard on. He come in here last 
Vensday, which by the by he’s agoing over the water 
to-night — hows’ever that’s neither here nor there. You 
see I’ve been agoing back’ards and for’ards about his 
business, and ha’ managed to pick up some of his story 
from the servants and them ; and so far as I can make it 
out, it seems to be summat to this here effect — ” 

“ Cut it short, old fellow,” interrupted Walker, 
who knew from former experience that he of the top- 


272 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


boots was neither very concise nor intelligible in liis 
narratives. 

“ Let me alone,” replied They, “ and I’ll ha’ vound up, 
and made my lucky in five seconds. This here young 
gen’lm’n’s father so I’ni told, mind ye — and the father 
(f the young voman, have always been on very bad, 
out-and-out, rig’lar knock-me-down sort o’ terms ; but 
somehow or another, when he was a-wisitin’ at some 
gentlefolk’s house, as he knowed at college, he came into 
contract with the young lady. He seed her several times, 
and then he up and said he’d keep company with her, if so 
be as she vos agreeable. Veil, she vos as swe«t upon 
him as he vos upon her, and so I s’pose they made it all 
right ; for they got married ’bout six months arterwards, 
unbeknown, mind ye, to the two fathers — leastways so 
I’m told. When they heard on it — my eyes, there was 
such a combustion ! Starvation vos the very least that 
vos to be done to ’em. The young gen’lm’n’s father cut 
him off vith a bob, ’cos he’d cut himself off vith a wife ; 
and the young lady’s father he behaved even worser and 
more unnat’ral, for he not only blow’d her up dreadful, 
and swore he’d never see her again, but he employed a 
chap as I knows — and as you knows, Mr. Valker, a 
precious sight too well — to go about and buy up the 
bills and them things on which the young husband, 
thinking his governor ’ud come round agin, had raised 
the vind just to blow himself on vith for a time ; besides 
\'ich, he made all the interest he could to set other people 
agin him. Consequence vos, that he paid as long as he 
could ; but things he never expected to have to meet till 
he’d had time to turn himself round, come fast upon him, 
ind lie vos nabbed. He vos brought here, as I said 
afore, last Vensday, and I think there's about — all, 


MU. WATKINS TOTTLE. 


278 


half a dozen detainers agin him down-stairs now. I 
have been,” added Ikey, “ in the purfession these fifteen 
year, and I never met with such windictiveness afore ! ” 

“ Poor creeturs ! ” exclaimed the coal-dealer’s wife once 
more : again resorting to the same excellent prescrip- 
tion for nipping a sigh in the bud : “ Ah ! when they’ve 
seen as much trouble as I and my old man here have, 
they’ll be as cpmforta-ble under it as we are.” 

“The yomig lady’s a pretty creature,” said Walker, 
“ only she’s a little too delicate for my taste — there a’n’t 
enough of her. As to the young cove, he may be very 
respectable and what not, but he’s too down in the mouth 
for me — he a’n’t game.” 

“ Game ! ” exclaimed Ikey, who had been altering the 
position of a green-handled knife and fork at least a 
dozen times, in order that he might remain in the room 
under the pretext of having something to do. “ He’s 
game enough ven there’s anything to be fierce about ; 
but who could be game as you call it, Mr. Walker, with 
a pale young creetur like that, hanging about him ? — 
it’s enough to drive any man’s heart into his boots to see 
’em together — and no mistake at all about it. I never 
shall forget her first cornin’ here ; he wrote to her on the 
Thursday to come — I know he did, ’cos I took the 
letter. Uncommon fidgety he was all day to be sure, 
and in the evening he goes down into the office, and he 
says to Jacobs, says he, ‘ Sir, can I have the loan of a 
private room for a few minutes this evening, without in- 
curring any additional expense — just to see my wife 
in ? ’ says he. Jacobs looked as much as to say — ‘ Strike 
me bountiful if you a’n’t one of the modest sort ! ’ but as 
the gen’lm’n who had been in the back parlor had just 
gone out, and had paid for it for that day, he says — 

VOL. II. IS 


m 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


wreiTj grave — ‘ Sir,’ says he, it’s agin our rules to let 
private rooms to our lodgers on gratis terms, but,’ says 
he, ‘for a gentleman, I don’t mind breaking through 
them for once.’ So then he turns round to me, and says, 

‘ Ikey, put two mould candles in the back-parlor, and 
charge ’em to this gen’lm’n’s account,’ vich I did. Veil, 
by and by a hackney-coach comes up to the door, and 
there, sure enough, was the young lady, wrapped up in 
a hopera-cloak, as it might be, and ’all alone. I opened 
the gate that night, so I went up when the coach come, 
and he vos a-waitin’ at the parlor-door — and wasn’t he 
a-trembling, neither? The poor creetur see him, and 
could hardly walk to meet him. ‘ Oh, Harry ! ’ she 
says, ‘ that it should have come to this ; and all for my 
sake,’ says she, putting her hand upon his shoulder. So 
lie puts his arm round her pretty little waist, and leading 
her gently a little way into the room, so that he might be 
able to shut the door, he says so kind and soft-like — 

‘ Why, Kate,’ says he — ” 

“ Here’s the gentleman you want,” said Ikey, abruptly 
breaking off in his story, and introducing Mr. Gabriel 
Parsons to the crest-fallen Watkins Tottle, wdio at that 
moment entered the room. Watkins advanced with a 
wooden expression of passive endurance, and accepted 
the hand wliich Mr. Gabriel Parsons held out. 

“ I want to speak to you,” said Gabriel, with a look 
strongly expressive of his dislike of the company. 

“ This way,” replied the imprisoned one, leading the 
way to the front drawing-room, where rich debtors did 
the luxurious at the rate of a couple of guineas a day. 

“ Well, here I am,” said Watkins, as he sat down on 
the sofa ; and placing the palms of his hands on his 
knees, anxiously glanced at his friend’s countenance. 


MR. WATKINS TOTTLE. 


275 


“ Yes ; and here you’re likely to be,” said Gabriel, 
roolly, as he rattled the money in his unmentionable 
pockets, and looked out of the window. 

“ What’s the amount with the costs ? ” inqui;*ed Par- 
sons, after an awkward pause. 

“37/. 3s. lOd:’ 

“ Have you any money ? ” 

“ Nine and sixpence halfpenny.” 

Mr. Gabriel Parsons walked up and down the room 
for a few seconds, before he could make up his mind to 
disclose the plan he had formed ; he was accustomed to 
drive hard bargains, but was always most anxious to con- 
ceal his avarice. At length he stopped short, and said, 
“ Tottle, you owe me fifty pounds.” 

“ I do.” 

“ And from all I see, I infer that you are likely to owe 
it to me.” 

“ I fear I am.” 

“ Though you have every disposition to pay me if you 
could ? ” 

“ Certainly.” 

“ Then,” said Mr. Gabriel Parsons, “ listen ; here’s my 
proposition. You know my way of old. Accept it — 
yes or no — I will or I won’t. I’ll pay the debt and 
costs, and I’ll lend you 10^. more (which, added to your 
annuity, will enable you to carry on the war well) if 
you’ll give me your note of hand to pay me one hundred 
and fifty pounds within six months after you are married 
Vo Miss Lillerton.” 

“ My dear — ” 

“ Stop a minute — on one condition ; and that is, that 
you propose to Miss Lillerton at once.” 

“ At once ! My dear Parsons, consider.” 


276 


sketches by boz. 


“ It’s for you to consider, not me. She knows you 
well from reputation, though she did not know you per- 
sonally until lately. Notwithstanding all her maiden 
modesty, I think she’d be devilish glad to get married 
out of hand, with as little delay as possible. My 
wife has sounded her on the subject, and she has con- 
fessed.” 

“ What — what ? ” eagerly interrupted the enamored 
Watkins. 

“ Why,” replied Parsons, “ to say exactly what she 
has confessed, would be rather difficult, because they only 
spoke in hints, and so forth ; but my wdfe, who is no bad 
judge in these cases, declared to me that what she had 
confessed was as good as to say that she was not insen- 
sible of your merits — in fact, that no other man should 
have her.” 

Mr. Watkins Tottle rose hastily from his seat, and 
rang the bell. 

“ What’s that for ? ” inquired Parsons. 

“ I want to send the man for the bill stamp,” replied 
Mr. Watkins Tottle. 

“ Then you’ve made up your mind ? ” 

“ I have,” — and they shook hands most cordially. 
The note of hand was given — the debt and costs were 
paid — Ikey was satisfied for his trouble, and the two 
friends soon found themselves on that side of Mr. Solo- 
mon Jacobs’s establishment on which most of his visitors 
were very happy when they found themselves once again 
— to wit, the ow^side. 

“ Now,” said Mr. Gabriel Parsons, as they drove to 
Norwood together — “ you shall have an opportunity to 
make the disclosure to-night, and mind you speak out, 
Tottle.” 


MR. WATKINS TOTTLE. 


277 


“ I will — I will ! ” replied Watkins, valorously. 

“ How I should like to see you together,” ejaculated 
Mr. Gabriel Parsons. — “ What fun ! ” and he laughed 
so long and so loudly, that he disconcerted Mr. Watkins 
Tottle, and frightened the horse. 

“ There’s Fanny and your intended walking about on 
the lawn,” said Gabriel, as they approached the house 
— “ Mind your eye, Tottle.” 

“ Never fear,” replied Watkins, resolutely, as he made 
his way to the spot where the ladies were walking. 

“ Here’s Mr. Tottle, my dear,” said Mrs. Parsons, 
addressing Miss Lillerton. The lady turned quickly 
round, and acknowledged his courteous salute with the 
same sort of confusion that Watkins had noticed on their 
first interview,* but with something like a slight expres- 
sion of disappointment or carelessness. 

“ Did you see how glad she was to see you ? ” whis- 
pered Parsons to his friend. 

“ Why I really thought she looked as if she would 
ratheijiave seen somebody else,” replied Tottle. 

“ Pooh, nonsense ! ” whispered Parsons again — “ it’s 
always the way with the women, young or old. They 
never show how delighted they are to see those w’hose 
presence makes their hearts beat. It’s the way with the 
whole sex, and no man should have lived to your time 
of life without knowing it. Fanny confessed it to me, 
when we were first married, over and over again — see 
what it is to have a wife.” 

“ Certainly,” whispered Tottle, whose courage was 
vanishing fast. 

“ Well, now, you’d better begin to pave the way,” said 
Parsons, who, having invested some money in the specu- 
lation, assumed the office of director. 


278 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


‘‘ Yes, yes, I will — presently,” replied Tottle, greatly 
flurried. 

“ Say something to her, man,” urged Parsons again. 
“ Confound it ! pay her a compliment, can’t you ? ” 

“ No ! not till after dinner,” replied the bashful Tottle, 
anxious to postpone the evil moment. 

“ Well, gentlemen,” said Mrs. Parsons, “ you are really 
very polite; you stay away the whole morning, after 
promising to take us out, and when you do come home, 
you stand whispering together and take no notice of 
us.” 

“We were talking of the business, my dear, which 
detained us this morning,” replied Parsons, looking 
significantly at Tottle. 

“ Dear me ! how very quickly the morning has gone,” 
said Miss Lillerton, referring to the gold watch, which 
was wound up on state occasions, whether it required it 
or not., 

“ I think it has passed very slowly,” mildly suggested 
Tottle. • 

(“ That’s right — bravo ! ”) whispered Parsons. 

“ Indeed ! ” said Miss Lillerton, with an air of majestic 
surprise. 

“ I can only impute it to my unavoidable absence from 
your society, madam,” said Watkins, “ and that of Mrs. 
Parsons.” 

During this short dialogue, the ladies had been lead- 
ing the way to the house. 

“ What the deuce did you stick Fanny into that last 
compliment for ? ” inquired Parsons, as they followed to- 
gether ; “ it quite spoilt the effect.” 

“ Oh ! it really would have been too broad without,” 
replied Watkins Tottle, “ much too broad ! ” 


]MR. WATKINS TOTTLE. 


279 


“ He’s mad ! ” Parsons whispered his wife, as they 
3ntercd the drawing-room, “ mad from modesty.” 

“ Dear me ! ” ejaculated the lady, “ I never heard of 
Buch a thing.” 

“ You’ll find we have quite a family dinner, Mr. 
Tottle,” said Mrs. Parsons, when they sat down to table ; 
“ Miss Lillerton is one of us, and of course we make no 
stranger of you.” 

Mr. Watkins Tottle expressed a hope that the Parsons 
family never would make a stranger of him ; and wished 
internally that his bashfulness would allow him to feel a 
little less like a stranger himself. 

“ Take off the covers, Martha,” said Mrs. Parsons, 
directing the shifting of the scenery with great anxiety. 
The order was obeyed, and a pair of boiled fowls, with 
tongue and et ceteras, were displayed at the top, and a 
fillet of veal at the bottom. On one side of the table 
two green sauce-tureens, with ladles of the same, were 
setting to each other in a green dish ; and on the other 
was a curried rabbit, in a brown suit, turned up with 
lemon. 

“ Miss Lillerton, my dear,” said Mrs. Parsons, “ shall 
T assist you ? ” 

“ Thank you, no ; I think I’ll trouble Mr. Tottle.” 

Watkins started — trembled — helped the rabbit — 
and broke a tumbler. The countenance of the lady of 
tlie house, which had been all smiles previously, under- 
vent an awful change. 

“ Extremely sorry,” stammered Watkins, assisting him- 
self to currie and parsley and butter, in the extremity of 
bis confusion. 

Not the least consequence,” replied Mrs. Parsons, in 
9 . tone which implied that it was of the greatest conse- 


280 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


quence possible, — : directing aside the researches of the 
boy, who was groping under the table for the bits of 
broken glass. 

‘4 1 presume,” said Miss Lillerton, “that Mr. Tottle 
is aware of the interest which bachelors usually pay 
in such cases ; a dozen glasses for one i§ the lowest 
penalty.” 

Mr. Gabriel Parsons gave his friend an admonitory 
tread on the toe. Here was a clear hint that the sooner 
he ceased to be a bachelor and emancipated himself from 
such penalties, the better. Mr. Watkins Tottle viewed 
the observation in the same light, and challenged Mrs. 
Pai*sons to take wine, with a degree of presence of mind 
which, under all the circumstances, was really extraor- 
dinary. 

“ Miss Lillerton,” said Gabriel, “ may I have the pleas- 
ure ? ” 

“ I shall be most happy.” 

“ Tottle, will you assist INIiss Lillerton, and pass the 
decanter. Thank you.” (The usual pantomimic cere- 
mony of nodding and sipping gone through) — 

“ Tottle, were you ever in Suffolk ? ” inquired the 
master of the house, wlio was burning to tell one of his 
seven stock stories. 

“No,” responded Watkins, adding, by way of a saving 
clause, “ but Pve been in Devonshire.” 

“ Ah ! ” replied Gabriel, “ it was in Suffolk that a 
rather singular circumstance happened to me, many 
years ago. Did you ever happen to hear me men- 
tion it?” 

Mr. Watkins Tottle had happened to hear his friend 
mention it some four hundred times. Of course he ex- 
pressed great curiosity, and evinced the utmost impa- 


MR. WATKINS TOTTLE. 


281 


tience to hear the story again. Mr. Gabriel Parsons 
forthwith attempted to proceed, in spite of the interrup- 
tions to which, as our readers must frequently have ob- 
served, the master of the house is often exposed in such 
cases. We will attempt to give them an idea of our 
meaning. 

“When I was in Suffolk,” said Mr. Gabriel Par- 
sons — * 

“ Take off the fowls first, Martha,” said Mrs. Parsons. 
“ I beg your pardon, my dear.” 

“ When I was in Suffolk,” resumed Mr. Parsons, with 
an impatient glance at his wife, who pretended not to 
observe it, “ which is now some years ago, business led 
me to the town of Bury St. Edmund’s^ I had to stop 
at the principal places in my way, and therefore, for the 
sake of convenience, I travelled in a gig. I left Sud- 
bury one dark night — it was winter time — about nine 
o’clock ; the rain poured in torrents, the wind howled 
among the trees that skirted the roadside, and I was 
obliged to proceed at a foot-pace, for I could hardly see 
my hand before me, it was so dark — ” 

“John,” interrupted Mrs. Parsons, in a low, hollow 
voice, “ don’t spill that gravy.” 

“ Fanny,” said Parsons impatiently, “ I wish you’d 
defer these domestic reproofs to some more suitable time. 
Really, my dear, these constant interruptions are very 
annoying.” 

“ My dear, I didn’t interrupt you,” said Mrs. Parsons. 

“ But, my dear, you did interrupt me,” remonstrated 
Mr. Parsons. 

“ How very absurd you are, my love ! I must give 
directions to the servants ; I am quite sure that if I sat 
here and allowed John to spill the gravy over the new 


282 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


carpet, you’d be the first to find fault when you saw the 
stain to-raorrow morning.” 

“ Well,” continued Gabriel, with a resigned air, as if 
he knew there was no getting over the point about the 
carpet, “ I was just saying, it was so dark that I could 
hardly see my hand before me. The road was very 
lonely, and* I assure you, Tottle (this was a device to 
arrest the wandering attention of that indivic^ual, which 
was distracted by a confidential communication between 
Ml'S. Parsons and Martha, accompanied by the delivery 
of a large bunch of keys), I assure you, Tottle, I be- 
came somehow impressed with a sense of the loneliness 
of my situation — ” 

“ Pie to your master,” interrupted Mrs. Parsons, again 
directing the servant. 

“, Now, pray, my dear,” remonstrated Parsons once 
more, very pettishly. Mrs. P. turned up her hands and 
eyebrows, and appealed in dumb show to Miss Lillerton. 
“ As I turned a corner of the road,” resumed Gabriel, 
“ the horse stopped short, and reared tremendously. I 
pulled up, jumped out, ran to his head, and found a man 
lying on his back in the middle of the road, with his eyes 
fixed on the sky. I thought he was dead ; but no, he 
was alive, and there appeared to be nothing the matter 
with him. He jumped up, and putting his hand to his 
chesf, and fixing upon me the most earnest gaze you can 
magine, exclaimed — ” 

“ Pudding here,” said Mrs. Parsons. 

“ Oh ! it’s no use,” exclaimed tlie host, now rendered 
desperate. “ Here, Tottle ; a glass of wine. It’s use- 
less to attempt relating anything when Mrs. Parsons is 
present.” 

This attack was received in the usual way. Mrs, Par- 


MR. WATKINS TOTTLE. 


sons talked to Miss Lillerton and at her better half ; ex- 
patiated on the impatience of men generally ; hinted that 
her husband was peculiarly vicious in this respect, and 
wound up by insinuating that she must be one of the 
best tempers that ever existed, or she never could 
put up with it. Really what she had to endure some- 
times, was more than any one who saw her in every-day 
life could by possibility suppose. — The story was now a 
painful subject, and therefore Mr. Parsons declined to 
enter into any details, and contented himself by stating 
that the man was a maniac, who had escaped from a 
neighboring mad-house. 

The cloth was removed ; the ladies soon afterwards 
retired, and Miss Lillerton played the piano in the di-aw- 
ing-room overhead, very loudly, for the edification of the 
visitor. Mr. Watkins Tottle and Mr. Gabriel Parsons 
sat chatting comfortably enough, until the conclusion of 
the second bottle, when the latter, in proposing an ad- 
journment to the drawing-room, informed Watkins that 
he ‘had concerted a plan with his wife, for leaving him 
and Miss Lillerton alone, soon after tea. 

“ I say,” said Tottle, as they went up-stairs, “ don’t you 
think it would be better if we put it off till — till — to- 
morrow ? ” 

“ Don’t you think it would have been much better if 1 
had left you in that wretched hole I found you in this 
morning ? ” retorted Parsons, bluntly. 

“ Well — well — I only made a suggestion,” said poor 
Watkins Tottle, with a deep sigh. 

Tea was soon concluded, and Miss Lillerton drawing a 
gmall work-table on one side of the fire, and placing a 
'dttle wooden frame upon it, something like a miniature 


284 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


clay-mill without the horse, was soon busily engaged in 
making a watch-guard with brown silk. 

“ God bless me ! ” exclaimed Parsons, starting up with 
well-feigned surprise, “ I’ve forgotten those copfounded 
letters. Tottle, I know you’ll excuse me.” 

If Tottle had been a free agent, he would have allowed 
no one to leave the room on any pretence, except him- 
self. As it was, however, he was obliged to look cheer- 
ful when Parsons quitted the apartment. 

He had scarcely left, when Martha put her head into 
the room, with — “ Please, ma’am, you’re wanted.” 

Mrs. Parsons left the room, shut the door carefully 
after her, and JMr. Watkins Tottle was left alone with 
Miss Lillerton. 

For the first five minutes there was a dead silence. — 
Mr. Watkins Tottle was thinking how he should begin, 
and Miss Lillerton appeared to be thinking of nothing. 
The fire was burning low ; Mr. Watkins Tottle stirred 
it, and put some coals on. 

“ Hem ! ” coughed Miss Lillerton ; Mr. Watkins Tot- 
tle thought the fair creature had spoken. “ I beg youF 
pardon,” said he. 

“ Eh?” 

“ I thought you spoke.” 

“ No.” 

« Oh ! ” 

“'riiere are some books on the sofa, Mr. Tottle, if you 
would like to look at them,” said Miss Lillerton, after the 
bjpse of another five minutes. 

“ No, thank you,” returned Watkins : and then he 
ftdded, with a courage which was perfectly astonishing, 
even to himself, “ Madam, that is Miss Lillerton, I wish 
10 speak to you.” 


MR. WATKINS TOTTLE. 


285 


To me ! ” said Miss Lillerton, letting the silk drop 
from her hands, and sliding her chair back a few paces. 
— “ Speak — to me ! ” 

“ To you, madam — and on the subject of the state 
of your affections.” The lady hastily rose, and would 
have left the room ; but Mr. Watkins Tottle gently 
detained her by the hand, and holding it as far from him 
as the joint length of their arms would permit, he thus 
proceeded : “ Pray do not misunderstand me, or suppose 
that I am led to address you, after so short an acquaint- 
ance, by any feeling of my own merits — for merits I 
have none which could give me a claim to your hand. 
I hope you will acquit me of any presumption when I 
explain that I have been acquainted through Mrs. Par- 
sons, with the state — that is, that Mrs. Parsons has 

told me — at least, not Mrs. Parsons, but ” here 

Watkins began to wander, but Miss Lillerton relieved 
him. 

“ Am I to understand, Mr. Tottle, that Mrs. Parsons 
has acquainted you with my feeling — my affection — 
I mean my respect for an individual of the opposite 
sex ? ” 

“ She has.” 

“ Then, what ? ” inquired Miss Lillerton, averting her 
face, with a girlish air, “ what could, induce you to seek 
such an interview as this ? What can your object be ? 
How can I promote your happiness, Mr. Tottle?” 

Here was the time for a flourish — “ By allowing 
me,” replied Watkins, falling bump on his knees, and 
breaking two brace-buttons and a waistcoat-string, in 
ihe act — “ By allowing me to be your slave, your 
servant — in short, by unreservedly making me the 
confidant of your heart’s feelings — may I say, for the 


286 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


promotion of your own happiness — may I say, in order 
that you may become the wife of a kind and affectionate 
husband ? ” 

“ Disinterested creature ! ” exclaimed Miss Lillerton, 
hiding her face in a white pocket-handkerchief with an 
eyelet-hole border. 

Mr. Watkins Tottle thought that if the lady knew all, 
she might possibly alter her opinion on this last point. 
He raised the tip of her middle finger ceremoniously to 
his lips, and got off his knees as gracefully as he could. 
“ My information was correct ? ” he tremulously in- 
quired, when he was once more on his feet. 

“ It was.” Watkins elevated his hands and looked 
up to the ornament in the centre of the ceiling, which 
had been made for a lamp, by way of expressing his 
rapture. 

“ Our situation, Mr. Tottle,” resumed the lady, glan- 
cing at him through one of the eyelet-holes, “ is a most 
peculiar and delicate one.” 

“ It is,” said Mr. Tottle. 

“ Our acquaintance has been of so short duration,” said 
Miss Lillerton. 

“ Only a week,” assented Watkins Tottle. 

“ Oh ! more than that,” exclaimed the lady, in a tone 
of surprise. 

“ Indeed ! ” said Tottle. 

“ More than a month — more than two months ! ” said 
Miss Lillerton. 

“Eather odd, this,” thought Watkins. 

“ Oh ! ” he said, recollecting Parsons’s assurance that 
she had known him from report, “ I understand. But, 
my dear madam, pray consider. The longer this ac- 
quaintance has existed, the less reason is there for delay 


MR. WATKINS TOTTLE. 


287 


now. Wliy not at once fix a period for gratifying the 
hopes of your devoted admirer ? ” 

“ It has been represented to me again and again that 
this is the 0001*86 I ought to pursue,” replied Miss Liller- 
ton, “ but pardon my feelings of delicacy, Mr. Tottle — 
pray excuse this embarrassment — I have peculiar ideas 
on such subjects, and I am quite sure that I never could 
summon up fortitude enough to name the day to my fu- 
ture husband.” 

“ Then allow me to name it/’ said Tottle, eagerly. 

“ I should like to fix it myself,” replied Miss Liller- 
ton, bashfully, “but I cannot do so without at once 
resorting to a third party.” 

“ A third party ! ” thought Watkins Tottle ; “ who 
the deuce is that to be, I wonder ! ” 

“ Mr. Tottle,” continued Miss Lillerton, “ you have 
made me a most disinterested and kind offer — that offer 
I accept. Will you at once be the bearer of a note from 
me to — to Mr. Timson ? ” 

“ Mr. Timson ! ” said Watkins. 

“ After what has passed between us,” responded Miss 
Lillerton, still averting her head, “ you must understand 
wliom I mean ; Mr. Timson, tlie — the — clergyman.” 

“ Mr. Timson, the clergyman ! ” ejaculated Watkins 
Tottle, in a state of inexpressible beatitude, and positive 
wonder at his own success. “ Angel ! Certainly — this 
moment ! ” 

“ I’ll prepare it immediately,” said Miss Lillerton, 
making for the door ; “ the events of this day have 
flurried me so much, Mr. Tottle, that I shall not leave 
ray room again this evening ; I will send you the note 

the servant.” 

“ Stay — sUiy,” cried Watkins Tottle, still keeping a 


288 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


most respectful distance from the lady ; “ when shall we 
meet again ? ” 

“ Oh ! Mr. Tottle,” replied Miss Lillerton, coquet- 
tishly, “ when we are married, I can never see you too 
often, nor thank you too much ; ” and she left the room. 

Mr. Watkins Tottle flung himself into an arm-chair, 
and indulged in the most delicious reveries of future* 
bliss, in which the idea of “ Five hundred pounds per 
annum, with an uncontrolled power of disposing of it by 
her last will and testament,” was somehow or other the 
foremost. He had gone through the interview so well, 
and it had terminated so admirably, that he almost began 
to wish he had expressly stipulated for the settlement of 
the annual five hundred on himself. 

“ May I come in ? ” said Mr. Gabriel Parsons, peep- 
ing in at the door. 

“ You may,” replied Watkins. 

“ Well, have you done it ? ” anxiously inquired Gabriel. 

“Have I done it !” said Watkins Tottle, “Hush — 
I’m going to the clergyman.” 

“ No ! ” said Parsons. “ How well you have managed 
it ! ” 

“ Where does Timson live ? ” inquired Watkins. 

“At his uncle’s,” replied Gabriel, “just round the 
lane. He’s waiting for a living, and has been assisting 
his uncle here for the last two or thi-ee months. But 
how well you have done it — I didn’t think you could 
have carried it off so ! ” 

Mr. Watkins Tottle was proceeding to demonstrate 
that the Richardsonian princi}do wms the best on which 
love could possibly be made, when he was interrupted 
by the entrance of Martha, with a little pink note folded 
like a fancy cocked hat. 


MR. WATKINS TOTTLE. 289 

“ Miss Lillerton’s compliments,” said Martha, as she 
delivered it into Tottle’s hands, and vanished. 

“ Do you observe the delicacy ? ” said Tottle, appeal- 
ing to Mr. Gabriel Parsons. “ Compliments not love, by 
the servant, eh ? ” 

Mr. Gabriel Parsons didn’t exactly know what reply 
to make, so he poked the forefinger of his right hand 
between the third and fourth ribs of Mr. Watkins Tottle. 

Come,” said Watkins, when the explosion of mirth 
consequent on this practical jest had subsided, “ we’ll be 
off at once — let’s lose no time.” 

Capital ! ” echoed Gabriel Parsons ; and in five 
minutes they were at the garden-gate of the villa ten- 
anted by the uncle of Mr. Timson. 

“ Is Mr. Charles Timson at home ? ” inquired Mr. 
Watkins Tottle of Mr. Charles Timson’s uncle’s-man. 

“ Mr. Charles is at home,” replied the man, stammer- 
ing ; “ but he desired me to say he couldn’t be inter- 
rupted, sir, by any of the parishioners.” 

“7 am not a parishioner,” replied Watkins. 

Is Mr. Charles writing a sermon, Tom ? ” inquired 
Parsons, thrusting himself forward. 

No, Mr. Parsons, sir ; he’s not exactly writing a 
sermon, but he is practising the violoncello in his own 
bedroom, and gave strict orders not to be disturbed.” 

“ Say I’m here,” replied Gabriel, leading the way 
across the garden; “Mr. Parsons and Mr. Tottle, on 
private and particular business.” 

They were shown- into the parlor, and the servant de- 
parted to deliver his message. The distant groaning 
of the violoncello ceased ; footsteps were heard on the 
stairs ; and Mr. Timson presented himself, and shook 
hands with Parsons with the utmost cordiality. 

19 


von. II. 


290 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


"How do you do, sir?” said Watkius Tottle, with 
great solemnity. 

" How do you do, sir ? ” replied Timson, with as much 
coldness as if it were a matter of perfect indifference to 
him how he did, as it very likely was. 

" I beg to deliver this note to you,” said Watkins 
Tottle, producing the cocked hat. 

" From Miss Lillerton ! ” said Timson, suddenly 
changing color. " Pray sit down.” 

IVIi*. Watkins Tottle sat down ; and while Timson pe- 
rused the note, fixed his eyes on an oyster-sauce-colored 
portrait of the Archbishop of Canterbury, which hung 
over the fireplace. 

Mr. Timson rose from his seat when he had concluded 
the note, and looked dubiously at Parsons — “ May I 
ask,” he inquired, appealing to Watkins Tottle, “whether 
our friend here is acquainted with the object of your 
visit ? ” 

“Our friend is in my confidence,” replied Watkins, 
with considerable importance. 

“ Then, sir,” said Timson, seizing both Tottle’s hands, 
“ allow me in his presence to thank you most unfeignedly 
and cordially, for the noble part you have acted in this 
affair.” 

“ He thinks I recommended him,” thought Tottle. 
“ Confound these fellows ! they never think of anything 
but their fees.” 

“ I deeply regret having misunderstood your inten- 
tions, my dear sir,” continued Timson. “ Disinterested 
and manly, indeed ! There are very few men who would 
have acted as you have done.” 

Mr. Watkins Tottle could not help thinking that 
this last remark was anything but complimentaiy. 


MR. WATKINS TOTTLE. 


291 


He therefore inquired, rather hastily, “When is it to 
be ? ” 

“ On Thursday,” replied Timson, — “ on Thursday 
morning at half-past eight.” 

“ Uncommonly early,” observed Watkins Tottle, with 
an air of triumphant self-denial. “ I shall hardly be 
able to get down here by that hour.” (This was in- 
tended for a joke.) 

“ Never mind, my dear fellow,” replied Timson, all 
suavity, shaking hands with Tottle again most heartily, 
“ so long as we see you to breakfast, you know — ” 

“ Eh ! ” said Parsons, with one of the most extraor- 
dinaiy expressions of countenance that ever appeared in 
a human face. 

“What I” ejaculated Watkins Tottle, at the same 
moment. 

“ I say that so long as we see you to breakfast,” re- 
peated Timson, “ we will excuse your being absent from 
the ceremony, though of course your presence at it would 
give us the utmost pleasure.” 

Mr. Watkins Tottle staggered against the wall, and 
fixed his eyes on Timson with appalling perseverance. 

“ Timson,” said Parsons, hurriedly brushing his hat 
with his left arm, “when you say ‘us,^ whom do you 
mean ? ” 

Mr. Timson looked foolish in his turn, when he re- 
plied, “ Why — Mrs. Timson that will be this day week : 
Miss Lillerton that is — ” 

“ Now don’t stare at that idiot in the corner,” angrily 
exclaimed Parsons, as the extraordinary convulsions of 
Watkins Tottle’s countenance excited the wondering 
gaze of Timson, — “ but have the goodness to tell me 
II three words the contents of that note.” 


292 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


“ This note,” replied Timson, “ is from Miss Lillerton; 
to whom I have been for the last five weeks regularly 
engaged. Her singular scruples and strange feeling on 
some points have hitherto prevented my bringing the 
engagement to that termination which 1 so anxiously 
desire. She informs me here, that she sounded Mrs. 
Parsons with the view of making her her confidant and 
go-between, that Mrs. Parsons informed this elderly gen- 
tleman, Mr. Tottle, of the circumstance, and that he, in 
the most kind and delicate terms, offered to assist us in 
any way, and even undertook to convey this note, which 
contains the promise I have long sought in vain — an 
act of kindness for which I can never be sufficiently 
gi’ateful.” 

“ Gk)od night, Timson,” said Parsons, huriying off, and 
carrying the bewildered Tottle with him. 

“ Won’t you stay — and have something ? ” said 
Timson. 

“ No, thank ye,” replied Parsons ; “ I’ve had quite 
enough ; ” and away he went, followed by Watkins 
Tottle in a state of stupefaction. 

Mr. Gabriel Parsons whistled until they had walked 
some quarter of a mile past his own gate, when he 
suddenly stopped, and said, — 

“ You are a clever fellow, Tottle, a’n’t you ? ” 

“ I don’t know,” said the unfortunate Watkins. 

“ I suppose you’ll say this is Fanny’s fault, won’t you ? ” 
inquired Gabriel. 

“ I don’t know anything about it,” replied the bewil- 
dered Tottle. 

“ Well,” said Parsons, turning on his heel to go home, 
“ the next time you make an offer, you had better speak 
plainly, and don’t throw a chance away. And the next 


MR. WATKINS TOTTLE. 


293 


time you’re locked up in a spunging-house, just wait 
there till I come and take you out, there’s a good 
fellow.” 

How, or at what hour, Mr. Watkins Tottle returned 
to Cecil Street is unknown. His boots were seen out- 
side his bedroom-door next morning; but we have the 
authority of his landlady for stating that he neither 
emerged therefrom nor accepted sustenance for four-and- 
twenty hours. At the expiration of that period, and 
when a council of war was being held in the kitchen on 
the propriety of summoning the parochial beadle to break 
his door open, he rang his bell, and demanded a cup of 
milk-and-water. The next morning he went through the 
formalities of eating and drinking as usual, but a week 
afterwards he was seized with a relapse, while perusing 
the list of marriages in a morning paper, from which he 
never perfectly recovered. 

A few weeks after the last-named occurrence, the body 
of a gentleman unknown was found in the Regent’s canal. 
In the trousers-pockets were four shillings and threepence 
halfpenny ; a matrimonial advertisement from a lady, 
which appeared to have been cut out of a Sunday paper ; 
a toothpick, and a card-case, which it is confidently be- 
lieved would have led to the identification of the unfor- 
tunate gentleman, but for the circumstance of there 
being none but blank cards in it. Mr. Watkins Tottle 
absented himself from his lodgings shortly before. A 
bill, which has not been taken up, was presented next 
morning ; and a bill, which has not been taken down, was 
?oon afterwards affixed in his parlor-window. 


294 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


CHAPTER XL 

THE BLOOMSBURY CHRISTENING. 

[The Author may be permitted to observe that this sketch was pub- 
lished some time before the Farce entitled “ The Christening” Avas 
first represented.] 

Mr. Nicodemus Dumps, or, as his acquaintance 
called him, “ long Dumps,” was a bachelor, six feet 
high, and fifty years old ; cross, cadaverous, odd, and ill- 
natured. He was never happy but when he was miser- 
able ; and always miserable when he had the best reason 
to be happy. The only real comfort of his existence was 
to make everybody about him wretched — then he might 
be truly said to enjoy life. He was afflicted with a situa- 
tion in the Bank worth five hundred a year, and he rented 
a “ first-floor furnished,” at Pentonville, which he origi- 
nally took because it commanded a dismal prospect of an 
adjacent churchyard'. He was familiar with the face of 
every tombstone, and the burial service seemed to excite 
his strongest sympathy. His friends said he was surly 
— he insisted he was nervous ; they thought him a lucky 
dog, but he protested that he was “ the most unfortunate 
man in the world.” Cold as he was, and wretched as he 
declared himself to be, he was not wholly unsusceptible 
of attachments. He revered the memory of Hoyle, as 
he was himself an admirable and imperturbable whist- 
player, and he chuckled with delight at a fretful and 
impatient adversary. He adored King Herod for his 
massacre of the innocents ; and if he hated one thing 
more than another, it was a child. However, he could 


THE BLOOMSBURY CHRISTENING. 


295 


hardly be said to hate anything in particular, because he 
disliked everything in general ; but perhaps his greatest 
antipathies were cabs, old women, doors that would not 
shut, musical amateurs, and omnibus cads. He sub- 
scribed to the “ Society for the Suppression of Vice,” for 
the pleasure of putting a stop to any harmless amuse- 
ments ; and he contributed largely towards the support 
of two itinerant methodist parsons, in the amiable hope 
that if circumstances rendered any people happy in this 
world, they might perchance be rendered miserable by 
fears for the next. 

Mr. Dumps had a nephew who had been married 
about a year, and who was somewhat of a favorite with 
his uncle, because he was an admirable subject to exer- 
cise his misery-creating powei*s upon. Mr. Charles Kit- 
terbell was a small, sharp, spare man, with a very large 
head, and a broad, good-humored countenance. He 
looked like a faded giant, with the head and face partially 
restored ; and he had a cast in his eye which rendered 
it quite impossible for any one with whom he conversed 
to know where he was looking. His eyes appeared fixed 
on the wall, and he was staring you out of countenance ; 
in short, there was no catching his eye, and perhaps it is 
a merciful dispensation of Providence that such eyes' are 
not catching. In addition to these characteristics, it may 
be added that Mr. Charles Kitterbell was one of the 
most credulous and matter-of-fact little personages that 
ever took to himself a wife, and for himself a house ir 
Great Russell Street, Bedford Square. (Uncle Dumps 
always dropped the “ Bedford Square,” and inserted in 
lieu thereof the dreadful words “ Tottenham Court 
Road.”) 

No, but uncle, ’pon my life you must — you must 


296 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


promise to be godfather,” said Mr. Kitterbell, as he sal 
in conversation with his respected relative one morning. 

“ I cannot, indeed I cannot,” returned Dumps. 

“Well, but why not? Jemima will think it very un- 
kind. It’s very little trouble.” 

“ As to the trouble,” rejoined the most unhappy man 
in existence, “ I don’t mind that ; but my nerves are in 
that state — I cannot go through the ceremony. You 
know I don’t like going out. — For God’s sake, Charles, 
don’t fidget with that stool so ; you’ll drive me mad.” 
Mr. Kitterbell, quite regardless of his uncle’s nerves, 
had occupied himself for some ten minutes in describ- 
ing a circle on the floor with one leg of the office-stool 
on which he was seated, keeping the other three up in 
the air, and holding fast on by the desk. 

“ I beg your pardon, uncle,” said Kitterbell, quite 
abashed, suddenly releasing his hold of the desk, and 
bringing the three wandering legs back to the floor, with 
a force sufficient to drive them through it. 

“ But come, don’t refuse. If it’s a boy, you know, we 
must have two godfathers.” 

“ If it’s a boy ! ” said Dumps ; “ why can’t you say at 
once whether it is a boy or not ? ” 

“ I should be very happy to tell you, but it’s impossible 
I can undertake to say whether it’s a girl or a boy, if 
the child isn’t born yet.” 

“ Not born yet ! ” echoed Dumps, with a gleam of hope 
lighting up his lugubrious visage. “ Oh, well, it may be 
a girl, and then you won’t want me ; or if it is a boy, it 
may die before it is christened.” 

“ I hope not,” said the father that expec.ted to be, look- 
ing very grave. 

“I hope not,” acquiesced Dumps, evidently pleased 


THE BLOOMSBURY CHRISTENING. 


297 


with the subject. He was beginning to get happy. 1 
hope not, but distressing cases frequently occur during 
the first two or three days of a child’s life ; fits, I am 
told, are exceedingly common, and alarming convulsions 
are almost matters of course.” 

“ Lord, uncle,” ejaculated little Kitterbell, gasping for 
breath. 

“ Yes ; my landlady was confined — let me see — last 
Tuesday : an uncommonly fine boy. On the Thursday 
night the nurse was sitting with him upon her knee be- 
fore the fire, and he was as well as possible. Suddenly 
he became black in the face, and alarmingly spasmodic. 
The medical man was instantly sent for, and every 
’remedy was tried, but — ” 

“ How frightful 1 ” interrupted the horror-stricken 
Kitterbell. 

“ The child died, of course. However, your child may 
not die ; and if it should be a boy, and should live to be 
christened, why I suppose I must be one of the spon- 
sors.” Dumps was evidently good-natured on the faith 
of his anticipations. 

“ Thank you, uncle,” said his agitated nephew, grasp- 
ing his hand as warmly as if he had done him some 
essential service. “ Perhaps I had better not tell Mrs. 
K. what you have mentioned.” 

“ Why, if she’s low-spirited, perhaps you had better 
not mention the melancholy case to her,” returned Dumps, 
who of course had invented the whole story ; “ though 
perhaps it would be but doing your duty as a husband to 
prepare her for the worsC’ 

A day or two afterwards, as Dumps was perusing a 
morning paper at the chop-house which he regularly fre- 
quented, the following paragraph met his eye : — 


298 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


“ Births. — On Saturday, the 18th inst., iu Great Russell Street the 
lady of Charles Kitterbell, Esq., of a son.” 

“ It is a boy ! ” he exclaimed, dashing down the paper, 
to the astonishment of the waiters. “ It is a boy ! ” But 
he speedily regained his composure as his eye rested on 
a paragraph quoting the number of infant deaths from 
the bills of mortality. 

Six weeks passed away, and as no communication had 
been received from the Kitterbells, Dumps was beginning 
to flatter himself that the child was dead, when the fol- 
lowing note painfully resolved his doubts : — 

“ Great Russell Street. 

“ Monday morning. 

Dear Uxcle, — You will be delighted to hear that 
my dear Jemima has left her room, and that your future 
godson is getting on capitally. He was very thin at first, 
but he is getting much larger, and nurse says he is filling 
out every day. He cries a good deal, and is a very sin- 
gular color, which made Jemima and me rather uncomfort- 
able ; but as nurse says it’s natural, and as of course we 
know nothing about these things yet, we are quite satis- 
fied with what nurse says. We think he will be a sharp 
child ; and nurse says she’s sure he will, because he 
never goes to sleep. You will readily believe that we 
are all very happy, only we’re a little worn out for want 
of rest, as he keeps us awake all night ; but this we must 
expect, nurse says, for the first six or eight months. He 
has been vaccinated, but in consequence of the operation 
being rather awkwardly performed, some small particles 
of glass were introduced into the arm with the matter. 
Perhaps this may in some degree account for his being 
rather fractious ; at least, so nurse says. We propose 


THE BLOOMSBURY CHRISTENING. 


299 


to have him christened at twelve o’clock on Friday, at 
St. George’s church, in Hart Street, by the name of 
Frederick Charles William. Pray don’t be later than a 
quarter before twelve. We shall have a very few friends 
in the evening, when of course we shall see you. I am 
sorry to say that the dear boy appears rather restless 
and uneasy to-day : the cause, I fear, is fever. 

“ Believe me, dear Uncle, ■ 

“ Yours affectionately, 

“ Charles Kitterbell. 

P. S. — I open this note to say that we have just dis- 
covered the cause of little Frederick’s restlessness. It is 
not fever, as I apprehended, but a small pin, which nurse 
accidentally stuck in his leg yesterday evening. We 
have taken it out, and he appears more composed, though 
he still sobs a good deal.” 

It is almost unnecessary to say that the perusal of the 
above interesting statement was no great relief to the 
mind of the hypochondriacal Dumps. It was impossible 
to recede, however, and so he put the best face — that is 
to say, an uncommonly miserable one — upon the matter ; 
and purchased a handsome silver mug for the infant Kit- 
terbell, upon which he ordered the initials “ F. C. W. K.” 
with the customary untrained grape-vine-looking flour- 
ishes, and a large full stop, to be engraved fortliwith. 

Monday was a fine day, Tuesday was delightful, Wed- 
nesday was equal to either, and Thursday was finer than 
ever; four successive fine days in London! Hackney- 
coachmen became revolutionary, and crossing-sweepers 
began to doubt the existence of a First Cause. The 
Morning Herald informed its readers that an old woman 


POO 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


hi Camden Town had been heard to say that the fineness 
of the season was “ unprecedented in the memory of the 
oldest inhabitant ; ” and Islington clerks with large fami- 
lies and small salaries, left off’ their black gaiters, dis- 
dained to carry their once green cotton umbrellas, and 
walked to town in the conscious pride of white stockings 
find cleanly brushed Bluchers. Dumps beheld all this 
with an eye of supreme contempt — his triumph was at 
hand. He knew that if it had been fine for four weeks 
instead of four days, it would rain when he went out ; 
he was lugubriously happy in the conviction that Friday 
would be a wretched day — and so it was. “ I knew how 
it would be,’’ said Dumps, as he turned round opposite the 
Mansion House at half-past eleven o’clock on the Friday 
morning. “ I knew how it would be ; / am concerned, 
and that’s enough ; ” — and certainly the appearance of 
the day was sufficient to depress the spirits of a much 
more buoyant-hearted individual than himself. It had 
rained, without a moment’s cessation, since eight o’clock ; 
everybody that passed up Cheapside, and down Cheap- 
side, looked wet, cold, and dirty. All sorts of forgotten 
and long-concealed umbrellas had been put into requisi- 
tion. Cabs whisked about, with the “ fare ” as carefully 
boxed up behind two glazed calico curtains as any mys- 
terious picture in any one of Mi's. Radcliffe’s castles ; 
omnibus horses smoked like steam-engines ; nobody 
thought of “ standing up ” under doorways or arches ; 
they were painfully convinced it was a hopeless case ; 
and so everybody went hastily along, jumbling and jost- 
ling, and swearing and perspiring, and slipping about, like 
amateur skaters behind wooden chairs on the Serpentine 
on a frosty Sunday. 

Dumps paused ; he could not think of walking, being 


THE BLOOMSBURY CHRISTENING. 


301 


rather smai't for the christening. If he took a cab he 
was sure to be spilt, and a hackney-coach was too ex- 
pensive for his economical ideas. An omnibus was wait* 
ing at the opposite corner — it was a desperate case — 
he had never heard of an omnibus upsetting or running 
away, and if the cad did knock him down, he could “ pull 
him up ” in return. 

“ Now, sir ! ” cried the young gentleman who officiated 
as “ cad ” to the “ Lads of the Village,” which was the 
name of the machine just noticed. Dumps crossed. 

“This vay, .sir!” shouted* the driver of the “ Hark- 
away,” pulling up his vehicle immediately across the 
door of the opposition — “ This vay, sir — he’s full.” 
Dumps hesitated, whereupon the “ Lads of the Village ” 
commenced pouring out a torrent of abuse against the 
“ Hark-away ; ” but the conductor of the “ Admiral 
Napier ” settled the contest in a most satisfactory man- 
ner for all parties, by seizing Dumps round the waist, 
and thrusting him into the middle of his vehicle which 
had just come up and only wanted the sixteenth inside. 

“ All right,” said the “ Admiral,” and off the thing 
thundered, like a fire-engine at full gallop, with the kid- 
napped customer inside, standing in the position of a 
half doubled up bootjack, and falling about with every 
jerk of the machine, first on the one side and then on 
the other like a “ Jack-in-the-green,” on May-day, set- 
ting to the lady with a brass ladle. 

“For Heaven’s sake, where am I to sit?” inquired 
the miserable man of an old gentleman, into whose 
Btomach he had just fallen for the fourth time. 

“Anywhere but on my che&t^ sir,” replied the old 
gentleman in a surly tone. 

“ Perhaps the box would suit the gentleman better,” 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


suggested a very damp lawyer’s clerk, in a pink shirt, 
and a smirking countenance. 

After a great deal of struggling and falling about, 
Dumps at last' managed to squeeze himself into a seat, 
which in addition to the slight disadvantage of being be- 
tween a window that would not shut, and a door that 
must be open, placed him in close contact with a passen- 
ger who had been walking about all the morning without 
an umbrella, and who looked as if he had spent the day 
in a full water-butt — only wetter. 

“ Don’t bang the door so,” said Dumps to the con- 
ductor, as he shut it, after letting out four of the pas- 
sengers ; “ I am very nervous — it destroys me.” 

“ Did any gen’l’m’n say anythink ? ” replied the cad, 
thrusting in his head, and trying to look as if he didn’t 
understand the request. 

“ I told you not to bang the door so ! ” repeated 
Dumps, with an expression of countenance like the 
knave of clubs, in convulsions. 

“ Oh ! vy, it’s rather a singler circumstance about this 
here door, sir, that it von’t shut without banging,” replied 
the conductor ; and he opened the door very wide, and 
shut it again with a terrific bang, in proof of the asser- 
tion. 

“ I beg your pardon, sir,” said a little prim, wheezing 
old gentleman, sitting opposite Dumps, “ I beg your par- 
don ; but have you ever observed, when you have been 
in an omnibus on a wet day, that four people out of five 
always come in with large cotton umbrellas, without a 
handle at the top, or the brass spike at the bottom ? ” 

“ Why, sir,” returned Dumps, as he heard the clock 
strike twelve, “ it never struck me before ; but now you 
mention it, I — Hollo ! hollo ! ” shouted the persecuted 


THE BLOOMSBURY CHRISTENING. 


303 


individual, as the omnibus dashed past Druiy Lane, 
where he had directed to be set down. — “ Where is the 
cad ? ” 

“ I think he’s on the box, sir,” said the young gentle- 
man before noticed in the pink shirt, which looked like a 
white one ruled with red ink. 

“ I want to be set down ! ” said Dumps, in a faint 
voice, overcome by his previous efforts. 

“ I think these cads wants to be set down^^ returned 
the attorney’s clerk, chuckling at his sally. 

“ Hollo ! ” cried Dumps again. 

Hollo ! ” echoed the passengers. The omnibus passed 
St. Giles’s church. 

Hold hard ! ” said the conductor ; “ I’m blowed if we 
ha’n’t forgot the genT’m’n as vas to be set down at Doory 
Lane. — Now, sir, make haste, if you please,” he added, 
opening the door, and assisting Dumps out with as much 
coolness as if it was “ all right.” Dumps’s indignation 
was for once getting the better of his cynical equanimity. 
“ Drury Lane ! ” he gasped, with the voice of a boy in a 
cold bath for the first time. 

“ Doory Lane, sir ? — yes, sir, — third turning on the 
right-hand side, sir.” 

Dumps’s passion was paramount ; he clutched his um- 
brella, and was striding off with the firm determination 
of not paying the fare. The cad, by a remarkable coin- 
‘cidence, happened to entertain a directly contrary opin- 
ion, and Heaven knows how far the altercation would 
have proceeded if it had not been most ably and satis- 
factorily brought to a close by the driver. 

“ Hollo ! ” said that respectable person, standing up on 
>he box, and leaning with one hand on the roof of the 
;>mnibus. “ Hollo, Tom ! tell the gentleman if so be as 


304 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


he feels aggi'ieved, we will take him up to the Edge-er . 
(Edgeware) Road for nothing, and set him down at 
Doory Lane when we comes back. He can’t reject 
that, anyhow.” 

The argument was irresistible : Dumps paid the dis- 
puted sixpence, and in a quarter of an hour was on the 
staircase of No. 14, Great Russell Street. 

Everything indicated that preparations were making 
for the reception of “ a few friends ” in the evening. 
Two dozen extra tumblers, and four ditto wine-glasses — 
looking anything but transparent, with little bits of straw 
in them — were on the slab in the passage, just arrived. 
There was a great smell of nutmeg, port wine, and al- 
monds, on the staircase ; the covers were taken off the 
stair-cai’pet, and the figure of Venus on the first landing 
looked as if she were ashamed of the composition-candle 
in her right hand, which contrasted beautifully with the 
lamp-blacked drapery of the goddess of love. The female 
servant (who looked very warm and bustling) ushered 
Dumps into a front drawing-room, very prettily fur- 
nished, with a plentiful sprinkling of little baskets, paper 
table-mats, china watchmen, pink and gold albums, and 
rainbow-bound little, books on the different tables. 

“ Ah, uncle ! ” said Mr. Kitterbell, “ how .d’ye * do ? 
Allow me — Jemima, my dear — my uncle. I think 
you’ve seen Jemima before, sir ? ” 

“ Have had the pleasure” returned big Dumps, his 
tone and look making it doubtful whether in his life he 
liad ever experienced the sensation. 

“ I’m sure,” said Mrs. Kitterbell, with a languid smile, 
and a slight cough. “ I’m sure — hem — any friend — 
of Charles’s — hem — much less a relation, is — ’* 

“ I knew you’d say so, my love,” said little Kitterbell, 


THE BLOOMSBURY CHRISTENING. 


305 


wbo, while he appeared to be gazing on the opposite 
houses, was looking at his wife with a most affectionate 
air : “ Bless you ! ” The last two words were accompa- 
nied with a simper, and a squeeze of the hand, which 
stirred up all Uncle Dumps’s bile. 

“ Jane, tell nurse to bring down baby,” said Mrs. Kit- 
terbell, addressing the servant. Mrs. Kitterbell was a 
tall, thin young lady, wdth very light hair, and a particu- 
larly white face — one of those young women who almost 
invariably, though one hardly knows wliy, recall to one’s 
mind the idea of a cold fillet of veal. Out went the ser- 
vant, and in came the nurse, with a remarkably small 
parcel in her arms, packed up in a blue mantle trimmed 
with white fur. — This was the baby. 

“ Now, micle,” said Mr. Kitterbell, lifting up that part 
of the mantle Avhich covered the infant’s face, with an air 
of great triumph, “ W/io do you think he’s like ?” 

“He! he! Yes, who?” said Mrs. K., putting her arm 
through her husband’s, and looking up into Dumps’s face 
with an expression of as much interest as she was capa- 
ble of displaying. 

“ Good God, how small he is ! ” cried the amiable 
uncle, starting back with well-feigned surprise ; “ re- 
markahly small indeed.” 

“ Do you think so ? ” inquired poor little Kitterbell, 
rather alarmed. “ He’s a monster to what he was — 
a’n’t he, nurse ? ” 

“ He’s a dear,” said the nurse, squeezing the child, and 
evading the question — not because she scrupled to dis- 
guise the fact, but because she couldn’t afford to throw 
away the chance of Dumps’s half-crown. 

“ Well, but who is he like ?” inquired little Kitterbell. 

Dumps looked at the little pink heap before him, and 

VOL. II. 20 


806 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


only thought at the moment of the best mode of mortify- 
ing the youthful parents. 

“ I really don’t know who he’s like,” he answered, very 
well knowing the reply expected of him. 

“ Don’t you think he’s like me ? ” inquired his nephew 
with a knowing air. 

“ Oh, decidedly not ! ” returned Dumps, with an em- 
phasis not to be misunderstood. “ Decidedly not like 
you. — Oh, certainly not.” 

“ Like Jemima ? ” asked Kitterbell, faintly. 

“ Oh dear, no ; not in the least. I’m no judge, of 
course, in such cases ; but I really think he’s more like 
one of those little carved representations that one some- 
times sees blowing a trumpet on a tombstone ! ” The 
nurse stooped down over the child, and with great diffi- 
culty prevented an explosion of mirth. Pa and ma 
looked almost as miserable as their amiable uncle. 

“ Well ! ” said the disappointed little father, “ you’ll be 
better able to tell what he’s like by and by. You shall 
see him this evening with his mantle off.” 

“ Thank you,” said Dumps, feeling particularly grate- 
ful. 

Now, my love,” said Kitterbell to his wife, “ it’s time 
we were off We’re to meet the other godfather, and the 
godmother at the church, uncle, — Mr. and Mrs. Wilson 
from over the way — uncommonly nice people. My love, 
are you well wrapped up ? ” 

Yes, dear.” 

“ Are you sure you won’t have another shawl ? ” in- 
quired the anxious husband. 

“ No, sweet,” returned the charming mother, accepting 
Dumps’s proffered arm ; and the little party entered the 
hackney-coach that was to take them to the church; 


THE BLOOMSBURY CHRISTENING. 


307 


Dumps amusing Mrs. Kitterbell by expatiating largely 
on the danger of measles, thrush, teeth-cutting, and other 
interesting diseases to which children are subject. 

The ceremony (which occupied about five minutes) 
passed off without anything particular occurring. The 
clergyman had to dine some distance from town, and had 
two churchings, three christenings, and a funeral to per- 
form in something less than an hour. The godfathers 
and godmother, therefore, promised to renounce the devil 
and all his works — “ and all that sort of thing ” — as 
little Kitterbell said — “ in less than no time ; ” and, 
with the exception of Dumps nearly letting the child fall 
into the fobt when he handed it to the clergyman, the 
whole affair went off in the usual business-like and 
matter-of-course manner, and Dumps reentered the 
Bank-gates at two o’clock with a heavy heart, and the 
painful conviction that he was regularly booked for an 
evening party. 

Evening came — and so did Dumps’s pumps, black 
silk stockings, and white cravat which he had ordered to 
be forwarded, per boy, from Pentonville. The depressed 
godfather dressed himself at a friend’s counting-house, 
from whence, with his spirits fifty degrees below proof, 
he sallied forth — as the weather had cleared up, and 
the evening was tolerably fine — to walk to Great Rus- 
sell Street. Slowly he paced up Cheapside, Newgate 
Street, down Snow Hill, and up Holborn ditto, looking 
as grim as the figure-head of a man-of-war, and finding 
out fresh causes of misery at every step. As he was 
jrossing the corner of Hatton Garden, a man apparently 
intoxicated rushed against him, and would have knocked 
him down, had he not been providentially caught by a 
very genteel young man, who happened to be close to 


308 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


him at the time. The shock so disarranged Dumps’s 
nerves, as well as his dress, that he could hardly stand. 
The gentleman took his arm, and in the kindest manner 
walked with him as far as Furnival’s Inn. Dumps, 
for about the first time in his life, felt grateful and polite ; 
and he and the gentlemanly looking young man parted 
with mutual expressions of good will. 

“There are at least some well-disposed men in the 
world,” ruminated the misanthropical Dumps, as he pro- 
ceeded towards his destination. 

Rat — tat — ta-ra-ra-ra-ra-rat — knocked a hackney- 
coachman at Kitterbell’s door, in imitation of a gentle- 
man’s s'ervant, just as Dumps reached it ; ando'out came 
an old lady in a large toque, and an old gentleman in a 
blue coat, and three female copies of the old lady in pink 
dresses, and shoes to match. 

“ It’s a large party,” sighed the unhappy godfather, 
wiping the perspiration from his forehead, and leaning 
against the area-railings. It was some time before the 
miserable man could muster up courage to knock at the 
door, and when he did, the smart appearance of a neigh- 
boring greengrocer (who had been hired to wait for seven 
and sixpence, and whose calves alone were worth double 
the money), the lamp in the passage, and the Venus on 
the landing, added to the hum of many voices, and the 
sound of a harp and two violins, painfully convinced him 
that his surmises were but too well-founded. 

“ How are you ? ” said little Kitterbell, in a greater 
bustle than ever, bolting out of the little back-parlor with 
a corkscrew in his hand, and various particles of saw- 
lust, looking like so many inverted commas, on his inex- 
pressibles. 

“ Good God ! ” said Dumps, turning into the aforesaid 


THE BLOOMSBURY CHRISTENING. 


309 


parlor to put his shoes on which he had brought in his 
coat-pocket, and still more appalled by the sight of 
seven fresh-drawn corks, and a corresponding number of 
decanters. “ How many people are there up-stairs ? ” 

“ Oh, not above thirty-five. We’ve had the carpet 
taken up in the back drawing-room, and the piano and 
the card-tables are in the front. Jemima thought we’d 
better have a regular sit-down supper in the front parlor, 
because of the speechifying, and all that. But, Lord ! 
uncle, what’s the matter ? ” continued the excited little 
man, as Dumps stood with one shoe on, rummaging his 
pockets with the most frightful distortion of visage. 
“ What have you lost ? Your pocket-book ? ” - 

“ No,” returned Dumps, diving first into one pocket 
and then into the other, and speaking in a voice like Des- 
demona with the pillow over her mouth. 

“ Your card-case ? snuff-box ? the key of your lodg- 
ings ? ” continued Kitterbell, pouring question on ques- 
tion with the rapidity of lightning. 

“ No ! no ! ” ejaculated Dumps, still diving eagerly into 
his empty pocket. 

“ Not — not — the }nuff you spoke of this morning ? ” 
“ Yes, the mug / ” replied Dumps, sinking into a 
chair. 

“ How could you have done it ? ” inquired Kitterbell. 
‘‘ Are you sure you brought it out ? ” 

“ Yes ! - yes ! I see it all,” said Dumps, starting up as 
the idea flashed across his mind ; “ miserable dog that 1 
am — I was born to suffer. I see it all ; it was the gen- 
tlemanly looking young man ! ” 

“ Mr. Dumps ! ” shouted the greengrocer in a stento- 
tflan voice, as he ushered the somewhat recovered god- 
father into the drawing-room half an hour after the 


310 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


above declaration. “ Mr. Dumps ! ” — everybody looked 
at the door, and in came Dumps, feeling about as much 
out of place as a salmon might be supposed to be on a 
gravel-w^lk. 

‘‘ Happy to see you again,” said Mrs. Kitterbell, quite 
unconscious of the unfortunate man’s confusion and 
misery ; “ you must allow me to introduce you to a few 
of our friends : — my mamma, Mr. Dumps — my papa 
and sisters.” Dumps seized the hand of the mother as 
warmly as if she was his own parent, bowed to the 
young ladies, and against a gentleman behind him, and 
took no notice whatever of the father, who had been 
bowing incessantly for three minutes and a quarter. 

“ Uncle,” said little Kitterbell, after Dumps had been 
introduced to a select dozen or two, “ you must let me 
lead you to the other end of the room, to introduce you to 
my friend Danton. Such a splendid fellow ! — I’m sure 
you’ll like him — this way,” — Dumps followed as trac- 
tably as a tame bear. 

Mr. Danton was a young man of about five-and- 
twenty, with a considerable stock of impudence, and a 
very small share of ideas : he was a great favorite, espe- 
cially with young ladies of from sixteen to twenty-six 
years of age, both inclusive. He could imitate the 
French-horn to admiration, sang comic songs most inimi- 
tably, and had the most insinuating way of saying imper- 
tinent nothings to his doting female admirers. He had 
acquired, somehow or other, the reputation of being a 
great wit, and accordingly, whenever he opened his 
mouth, everybody who knew him laughed very heartily. 

The introduction took place in due form. Mr. Dan- 
♦on bowed, and twirled a lady’s handkerchief, which 
he held in his hand, in a most comic way. Everybody 
smiled. 


THE BLOOMSBURY CHRISTENING. 


311 


“ Very warm,” said Dumps, feeling it necessary to say 
something. 

“ Yes. It was warmer yesterday,” returned the brill- 
iant Mr. Danton. — A general laugh. 

“ I have great pleasure in congratulating you on your 
first appearance in the character of a father, sir,” he con- 
tinued, addressing Dumps — “ godfather, I mean.” — The 
young ladies were convulsed, and the gentlemen in 
ecstasies. 

A general hum of admiration interrupted the conver- 
sation, and announced the entrance of nurse with the 
baby. An universal rush of the young ladies imme- 
diately took place. (Girls are always so fond of babies 
in company.) 

“ Oh, you dear ! ” said one. 

“ How sweet ! ” cried another, in a low tone of the 
most enthusiastic admiration. 

“.Heavenly ! ” added a third. ^ 

“ Oh ! what dear little arms ! ” said a fourth, holding 
up an arm and fist about the size and shape of the leg 
of a fowl cleanly picked. 

“ Did you ever ! ” — said a little coquette with a large 
bustle, who looked like a French lithograph, appealing to 
a gentleman in three waistcoats — “ Did you ever ! ” 

“ Never in my life,” returned her admirei', pulling up 
his collar. 

“ Oh ! do let me take it, nurse,” cried another young 
lady. “ The love ! ” 

“ Can it open its eyes, nurse ? ” inquired another, 
affecting the utmost innocence. — Suffice it to say, that 
the single ladies unanimously voted him an angel, and 
that the married ones, nem. con., agreed that he was de- 
eidedly the finest baby they had ever beheld — except 
♦heir own. 


312 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


The quadrilles were resumed -wdlh great spirit. Mr. 
Danton was universally admitted to be beyond himself, 
several young ladies enchanted the company and gained 
admirers by singing “We met” — “I saw her at the 
Fancy Fair ” — and other equally sentimental and inter- 
esting ballads. “ The young men,” as Mrs. Kitterbell 
said, “ made themselves very agreeable ; ” the girls did 
not lose their opportunity ; and the evening promised to 
go off excellently. Dumps didn’t mind it ; he had de- 
vised a plan for himself — a little bit of fun in his own 
way — and he was almost happy ! He played a rubber 
and lost every point. Mr. Danton said he could not 
have lost every point, because he made a point of 
losing : everybody »laughed tremendously. Dumps re- 
torted with a better joke, and nobody smiled, with the 
exception of the host, who seemed to consider it his 
duty to laugh till he was black in the face, at every- 
thing. There was only one drawback — the musicians 
did not play with quite as much spirit as could have been 
wished. The cause, however, was satisfactorily explain- 
ed ; for it appeared, on the testimony of a gentleman who 
had come up from Gravesend in the afternoon, that they 
had been engaged on board a steamer all day, and had 
played almost without cessation all the way to Graves- 
end, and all the way back again. 

The “ sit-down supper ” was excellent ; there were 
four barley-sugar temples on the table, which would 
have looked beautiful if they had not melted away when 
the supper began ; and a water-mill, whose only fault 
was that instead of going round it ran over the table- 
cloth. Then there were fowls, and tongue, and trifle, 
and sweets, and lobster salad, and potted beef — and 
everything. And little Kitterbell kept calling out for 


THE BLOOMSBURY CHRISTENING. 318 

dean plates, and the clean plates did not come ; and 
then the gentlemen who wanted tlie plates said they 
didn^t mind, they’d take a lady’s ; and then Mrs. Kitter* 
bell applauded their gallantry, and the greengrocer ran 
about till he thought his seven and sixpence was very 
hardly earned ; and the young ladies didn’t eat much for 
fear it shouldn’t look romantic, and the married ladies ate 
as much as possible, for fear they shouldn’t have enough ; 
and a great deal of wine was drunk, and everybody 
talked and laughed considerably. 

“ Hush ! hush ! ” said Mr. Kitterbell, rising and look- 
ing very important. “ My love (this was addressed to 
his wife at the other end of the table), take cai’e of Mrs. 
Maxwell, and your mamma and the rest of the married 
ladies ; the gentlemen will persuade the young ladies to 
fill their glasses, I am sure. 

“ Ladies and gentlemen,” said long Dumps, in a very 
sepulchral voice and rueful accent, rising from his chair 
like the ghost in Don Juan, will you have the kindness 
to charge your glasses I am desirous of proposing a 
toast.” 

A dead silence ensued, and the glasses were filled — 
everybody looked serious. 

Ladies and gentlemen,” slowly continued the omi- 
nous Dumps, “ I ” — (here Mr. Danton imitated two 
notes fix)m the French-horn, in a very loud key, which 
electrified the nervous toast-proposer, and convulsed his 
audience). 

“ Order I order ! ” said little Kitterbell, endeavoring to 
suppress his laughter. 

‘‘ Order ! ” said the gentlemen. 

“ Danton, be quiet,” said a particular friend on the 
opposite side of the table. 


814 


SIOiTCHES BY BOZ. 


‘‘ Ladies and gentlemen,” resumed Dumps, somewhat 
recovered, and not much disconcerted, for he was always 
a pretty good hand at a speech — “ In accordance with 
what is, I believe, the established usage on these occa- 
sions, I, as one of the godfathers of Master Frederick 
Charles William Kitterbell — (iiere the speaker’s voice 
faltered, for he remembered the mug) — venture to rise 
to propose a toast. I need hardly say that it is the health 
and prosperity of that young gentleman, the particular 
event of whose early life we are here to celebrate — 
(applause). Ladies ami gentlemen, it is impossible to 
suppose that our friends here, whose sincere well-wishers 
we all are, can pass through life without some trials, con- 
siderable suffering, severe affliction, and heavy losses I ” 
— Here tlie ai-ch-traitor paused, and slowly drew forth a 
long, white pocket-handkerchief — .his example was fol- 
lowed by several ladies. “ That these trials may be long 
spared them is my most earnest prayer, my most fervent 
wish (a distinct sob from the grandmother). I hope and 
trust, ladies and gentlemen, that the infant whose chris- 
tening we have this evening met to celebrate, may not 
be removed from the arms of his parents by premature 
decay (several cambrics were in requisition) ; that his 
young and now apparently healthy form may not be 
Wilted by lingering disease. (Here Dumps cast a sar- 
donic glance ai'ound, for a great sensation was manifest 
among the married ladies.) You, I am sure, will concur 
with me in wishing that he may live to be a comfort and 
a blessing to his parents. (‘ Hear, hear ! ’ and an audible 
sob from Mr. Kitterbell.) But should he not be Avhat 
we could wish — should he forget in after-times the 
duty which he owes to them — should they unhappily ex- 
perience that distracting truth, ‘ how sharper than a ser- 


THE BLOOMSBURY CHRISTENING. 


315 


pent’s tooth it is to have a thankless child.’ ” — Here 
Mrs. Kitterbell, with her handkerchief to her eyes, and 
accompanied by several ladies, rushed from the room, 
and went into violent hysterics in the passage, leaving 
her better half in almost as bad a condition, and a gen- 
eral impression in Dumps’s favor ; for people like senti- 
ment, after all. 

It need hardly be added, that this occurrence quite put 
a stop to the harmony of the evening. Vinegar, harts- 
horn, and cold water, were now as much in request as 
negus, rout-cakes, and hon-hons had been a short time 
before. Mrs. Kitterbell was immediately conveyed to 
her apartment, the musicians were silenced, flirting 
ceased, and the company slowly departed. Dumps left 
the house at the commencement of the bustle, and walked 
home with a light step, and (for him) a cheerful heart. His 
landlady who slept in the next room, has offered to make 
oath that she heard him laugh, in his peculiar manner, 
after he had locked his door. The assertion, however, is 
so improbable, and bears on the face of it such strong 
evidence of untruth, that it has never obtained credence 
to this hour. 

The family of Mr. Kitterbell has considerably in- 
creased since the period to which we have referred ; he 
has now two sons and a daughter ; and as he expects, at 
no distant period, to have another addition to his bloom- 
ing progeny, he is anxious to secure an eligible godfather 
for the occasion. He is determined, however, to impose 
upon him two conditions. He must bind himself, by a 
solemn obligation, not to make any speech after supper ; 
and it is indispensable that he should be in no way con- 
nected with “ the most miserable man in the world.” 


316 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


CHAPTER XIL 

THE drunkard’s DEATH. 

We will be bold to say, that there is scarcely a man 
in the constant habit of walking, day after day, through 
any of the crowded thoroughfares of London, who can- 
not recollect among the people whom he “ knows by 
sight,” to use a familiar phrase, some being of abject and 
wretched appearance whom he remembers to have seen 
in a very different condition, whom he has observed sink- 
ing lower and lower, by almost imperceptible degrees, and 
the shabbiness and utter destitution of whose appearance, 
at last, strike forcibly and painfully upon him, as he 
passes by. Is thei'e any man who has mixed much 
with society, or whose avocations have caused him to 
mingle, at one time or other, with a great number of 
people, who cannot call to mind the time when some 
shabby, miserable wretch, in rags and filth, who shuffles 
past him now in all the squalor of disease and poverty, 
was a respectable tradesman, or a clerk, or a man follow- 
ing some thriving pursuit, with good prospects, and de- 
cent means ? — or cannot any of our readers call to mind 
from among the list of their quondam acquaintance, some 
tallen and degraded man, who lingers about the pave- 
ment in hungry misery — from whom every one turns 
coldly away, and who preserves himself from sheer star- 
vation, nobody knows how ? Alas ! such cases are of too 
frequent occurrence to be rare items in any man’s expe- 
rience ; and but too often arise from one cause — drunk- 


THE DRUNKARD’S DEATH. 


317 


enness — that fierce rage for the slow, sure poison, that 
oversteps every other consideration; that casts aside 
wife, children, friends, happiness, and station ; and hur- 
ries its victims madly on to degradation and death. 

, Some of these men have been impelled, by misfortune 
and misery, to the vice that has degraded them. The 
ruin of worldly expectations, the death of those they 
loved, the sorrow that slowly consumes, but will not 
break the heart, has driven them wild ; and they present 
the hideous spectacle of madmen, slowly dying by their 
own hands. But by far the greater part have wil- 
fully, and with open eyes, plunged into the gulf from 
which the man who once enters it never rises more, but 
into which he sinks deeper and deeper down, until recov- 
ery is hopeless. 

Such a man as this once stood by the bedside of his 
dying wife, while his children knelt around and mingled 
low bursts of grief with their innocent prayers. The 
room was scantily and meanly furnished ; and it needed 
but a glance at the pale form from which the light of life 
was fast passing away, to know that grief, and want, and 
anxious care, had been busy at the heart for many a 
weary year. An elderly female, with her face bathed 
in tears, was supporting the head of the dying woman — 
her daughter — on her arm. But it was not towards her 
that the wan face turned ; it was not her hand that the 
cold and trembling fingers clasped; they pressed the 
lusband’s arm ; the eyes so soon to be closed in death 
rested on his face, and the man shook beneath their gaze. 
His dress was slovenly and disordered, his face inflamed, 
his eyes bloodshot and heavy. He had been summoned 
fix)m some wild debauch to the bed of sorrow and death, 

A shaded lamp by the bedside cast a dim light on the 


318 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


figures around, and left the remainder of the room in 
thick, deep shadow. The silence of night prevailed 
without the house, and the stillness of death was in the 
chamber. A watch hung over the mantel-shelf ; its low 
ticking was the only sound that broke the profound quiet, 
but it was a solemn one, for well they knew who heal'd 
it, that before it had recorded the passing of another 
hour, it would beat the knell of a departed spirit. 

It is a dreadful thing to wait and watch for the ap- 
proach of death ; to know that hope is gone, and recov- 
ery impossible ; and to sit and count the dreary hours 
through long, long, nights — such nights as only watch- 
ers by the bed of sickness know. It chills the blood to 
hear the dearest secrets of the heart — the pent-up, hid- 
den secrets of many years — poured forth by the uncon- 
scious helpless being before you ; and to think how little 
the reserve and cunning of a \yhole life will avail, when 
fever and delirium tear off the mask at last. Strange 
tales have been told in the wanderings of dying men ; 
tales so full of guilt and crime, that those who stood by 
the sick person’s couch have fled in horror and affright, 
lest they should be scared to madness by what they heard 
and saw ; and many a wretch has died alone, raving of 
deeds the very name of which has driven the boldest 
man away. 

But no such ravings were to be heard at the bedside 
by which the children knelt. Their half-stifled sobs am 
moanings alone broke the silence of the lonely chamber 
And when at last the mother’s grasp . relaxed, and, turn- 
ing one look from the children to their father, she vainly 
strove to speak, and fell backward on the pillow, all was 
so calm and tranquil that she seemed to sink to sleep. 
They leant over her ; they called upon her name, softly 


THE DRUNKARD’S DEATH. 


319 


at first, and then in the loud and piercing tones of despe- 
ration. But there was no reply. They listened for her 
breath, but no sound came. They felt for the palpitation 
of the heart, but no faint throb responded to the touch. 
That heart was broken, and she was dead ! 

The husband sunk into a chair by the bedside, and 
clasped his hands upon his burning forehead. He gazed 
from child to child, but when a weeping eye met his, he 
quailed beneath its look. No word of comfort was whis- 
pei’ed in his ear, no look of kindness lighted on his face. 
All shrunk from and avoided him ; and when at last he 
staggered from the room, no one sought to follow or con- 
sole the widower. 

The time had been when many a friend would have 
crowded round him in his affiction, and many a heartfelt 
condolence would have met him in his grief. Where 
were they now ? One by one, friends, relations, the 
commonest acquaintance even, had fallen off from and 
deserted the drunkard. His wife alone had climg to 
him in good and evil, in sickness and poverty ; and how 
had he rewarded her ? He had reeled from the tavern 
to her bedside, in time to see her die. 

He rushed from the house, and walked swiftly 
through the streets. Remorse, fear, shame, all crowded 
on his mind. Stupefied with drink, and bewildered with 
the scene he had just witnessed, he re-entered the tavern 
he had quitted shortly before. Glass succeeded glass. 
His blood mounted, and his brain whirled round. 
Death ! Every one must die, and why not she. She 
was too good for him ; her relations had often told him 
*0. Curses on them ! Had they not deserted her, and 
left her to whine away the time at home Well — she 
was dead, and happy perhaps. It was better as it was. 


820 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


Another glass — one more ! Hurrah ! It was a meri^ 
life while it lasted ; and he would make the most of it. 

Time went on ; the three children who were left to 
him, grew up, and were children no longer. The father 
remained the same — poorer, shabbier, and more disso- 
lute-looking, but the same confirmed and irreclaimable 
drunkard. The boys had, long ago, run wild in the 
streets, and left him ; the girl alone remained, but she 
worked hard, and words or blows could always procure 
liim something for the tavern. So he went on in the old 
course, and a merry life he led. 

One night, as early as ten o’clock, for the girl had been 
sick for many days, and there was, consequently, little to 
spend at the public-house — he bent his steps home- 
wards, bethinking himself that if he would have her 
able to earn money, it would be as well to apply to the 
parish surgeon, or, at all events, to take the trouble of 
inquiring what ailed her, which he had not yet thought 
it worth while to do. It was a wet December night ; 
the wind blew piercing cold, and the rain poured heavily 
down. He begged a few halfpence from a passer-by, and 
having bou^t a small loaf (for it was his interest to keep 
the gii'l alive, if he could), he shuffled onwards as fast as 
the wind and rain would let him. 

At the back of Fleet Street, and lying between it 
and the water-side, are several mean and narrow courts, 
which form a portion of Whitefriars ; it was to one of 
these that he directed his steps. 

The alley into which he turned, might, for filth and 
misery, have competed with the darkest comer of this 
ancient sanctuary in its dirtiest and most lawless time. 
The houses, varying from two stories in height to four, 
were stained with every indesciabable hue that long ex- 


THE DRUNKARD’S DEATH. 


321 


posure to the weather, damp, and rottenness can impart 
to tenements composed originally of the roughest and 
coarsest materials. The windows were patched with 
paper, and stuffed with the foulest rag's ; the doors were 
falling from their hinges ; poles with lines on which to 
dry clothes, projected from every casement, and sounds 
of quarrelling or drunkenness issued from every room. 

The solitary oil lamp in the centre of the court had 
been blown out, either by the violence of the wind or 
the act of some inhabitant who had excellent reasons for 
objecting to his residence being rendered too conspicuous ; 
and the only light which fell upon the broken and uneven 
pavement, was derived from the miserable candles that 
here and there dwindled in the rooms of such of the 
more fortunate residents as could afford to indulge in so 
expensive a luxury. A gutter ran down the centre of 
the alley — all the sluggish odors of which had been 
called forth by the rain ; and as the wind whistled 
through the old houses, the doors and shutters creaked 
upon their hinges, and the windows shook in their frames, 
with a violence which every moment seemed to threaten 
the destruction of the whole place. 

The man whom we have followed into this den, walked 
on in the darkness, sometimes stumbling into the main 
gutter, and at others into some branch repositories of 
garbage which had been formed by the rain, until he 
reached the last house in the court. The door, or rather 
what was left of it, stood ajar, for the convenience of the 
numerous lodgers ; and he proceeded to grope his way up 
the old and broken stair, to the attic story. 

He was within a step or two of his room -door, 
vhen it opened, and a girl, whose miserable and ema- 
ciated appearance was only to be equalled by that of 
21 


VOL. II. 


822 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


the candle which she shaded with her hand, peeped anz 
iously out. 

“ Is that you, father ? ” said the girl. 

“ Who else should it be ? ” replied the man gruffly. 
“What are you trembling at? It’s little enough that 
I’ve had to drink to-day, for there’s no drink without 
money, and no money without work. What the devil’s 
the matter with the girl ? ” 

“ I am not well, father — not at all well,” said the girl, 
•bursting into tears. 

“ Ah ! ” replied the man, in the tone of a person w'ho 
is compelled to admit a very unpleasant fact, to which he 
would rather remain blind, if he could. “ You must get 
better somehow, for we must have money. You must 
go to the parish doctor, and make him give you some 
medicine. They’re paid for it, damn ’em. What are 
you standing before the door for? Let me come in, 
can’t you ? ” 

“ Father,” whispered the girl, shutting the door behind 
her, and placing herself before it, “ William has come 
back.” 

“ Who ! ” said the man with a start. 

“ Hush,” replied the girl, “ William ; brother Wil- 
liam.” 

“ And what does he want ? ” said the man, with an 
effort at composure — “ money ? meat ? drink ? He’s 
come to the wrong shop for that, if he does. Give me 
the candle — give me the candle, fool — I a’n’t going to 
hurt him.” He snatched the candle from her hand, and 
walked into the room. 

Sitting on an old box, with his head resting on his 
hand, and his eyes fixed on a wretched cinder fire that 
was smouldering on the hearth, was a young man of 


THE DRUNKARD’S DEATH. 


828 


aDout two-and-twenty, miserably clad in an old coarse 
jacket and trousers. He started up when his father 
entered. 

“ Fasten the door, Mary,” said the young man hastily 
— “Fasten the door. You look as if you didn’t know 
me, father. It’s long enough since you drove me from 
home ; you may well forget me.” 

“ And what do you want here, now ? ” said the father, 
seating himself on a stool, on the other side of the fire- 
place. “ What do you want here, now ? ” 

“ Shelter,” replied the son. “ I’m in trouble ; that’s 
enough. If I’m caught I shall swing ; that’s certain. 
Caught I shall be, unless I stop here ; that’s as certain. 
And there’s an end of it.” 

“ You mean to say, you’ve been robbing, or murdering, 
then ? ” said the father. 

“Yes I do,” replied the son. “ Does it surprise you, 
father ? ” He looked steadily in the man’s face, but he 
withdrew his eyes, and bent them on the ground. 

“ Where’s your brothers ” he said, after a long pause. 

“ Where they’ll never trouble you,” replied his son : 
“ John ’s gone to America, and Henry ’s dead.” 

“ Dead ! ” said the father, with a shudder, ^hich even 
he could not repress. 

“ Dead,” replied the young man. ‘“He died in my 
arms — shot like a dog, by a gamekeeper. He staggered 
back, I caught him, and his blood trickled down my 
hands. It poured out from his side like water. He was 
weak, and it blinded him, but he threw himself down on 
his knees, on the grass, and prayed to God, that if his 
mother was in heaven, He would hear her prayers for 
oardon for her youngest son. ‘ I was her favorite boy, 
iVill,’ he said, ‘ and I am glad to think, now, that when 


324 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


she was dying, though I was a very young child then, 
and my little heart was almost bursting, I knelt down at 
the foot of the bed, and thanked God for having made 
me so fond of Iter as to have never once done anything 
to bring the tears into her eyes. O Will, why was she 
taken away, and father left ! ’ There’s his dying words, 
father,” said the young man ; “ make the best you can 
of ^em. You struck him across the face, in a drunken 
fit, the morning we ran away ; and here’s the end of 
it!” 

The girl wept aloud ; and the father, sinking his head 
upon his knees, rocked himself to and fro. 

If I am taken,” said the young man, “ I shall be car- 
ried back into the country, and hung for that man’s mur- 
der. They cannot trace me here, without your assist- 
ance, father. For aught I know, you may give me up 
to justice ; but unless you do, here I stop, until I can 
venture to escape abroad.” 

For two whole days, all three remained in the wretched 
room, without stirring out. On the third evening, how- 
ever, the girl was worse than she had been yet, and the 
few scraps of food they had were gone. It was indis- 
pensably necessary that somebody should go out ; and as 
the girl was too weak and ill, the father went, just at 
nightfall. 

He got some medicine for the girl, and a trifle in the 
way of pecuniary assistance. On his way back, he earned 
sixpence by holding a horse ; and he turned homewai’ds 
with enough money to supply their most pressing wants 
for two or three days to come. He had to pass the public- 
house. He lingered for an instant, walked past it, turned 
back again, lingered once more, and finally slunk in. 
Two men whom he had not observed, were on the watch. 


THE DRUNKARD’S DEATH. 


S25 


They were on the point of giving up their search in de- 
spair, when his loitering attracted their attention ; and 
when he entered the public-house, they followed him. 

You’ll drink with me, master,” said one of them, 
proffering him a glass of liquor. 

“ And me too,” said the other, replenishing the glass 
as soon as it was drained of its contents. 

The man thought of his hungry children, and his son’s 
danger. But they were nothing to the drunkard. He 
did drink ; and his reason left him. 

‘‘ A wet night, Warden,” whispered one of the men in 
his ear, as he at length turned to go away, after spending 
in liquor one-half of the money on which, perhaps, his 
daughter’s life depended. 

“ The right sort of night for our friends in hiding. 
Master Warden,” whispered the cfther. 

“ Sit down here,” said the one who had spoken first, 
drawing him into a corner. “We have been looking 
arter the young un. We came to tell him, it’s all right 
now, but we couldn’t find him, ’cause we hadn’t got the 
precise direction. But that a’n’t strange, for I don’t 
think he know’d it himself, when he come to London, did 
he.?” 

“ No, he didn’t,” replied the father. 

The two men exchanged glances. 

“ There’s a vessel down at the docks, to sail at mid- 
night, when it’s high water,” resumed the first speaker, 
“ and we’ll put him on board. His passage is taken in 
another name, and what’s better than that, it’s paid for. 
It’s lucky we met you.” 

“ Very,” said the second. 

“ Capital luck,” said the first, with a wink to his com- 
oanion. 


326 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


“ Great,” replied the second, with a slight nod of intel- 
ligence. 

“ Another glass here ; quick ” — said the first speaker. 
And in five minutes more, the father had unconsciously 
yielded up his own son into the hangman’s hands. 

Slowly and heavily the time dragged along, as the 
brother and sister, in their miserable hiding-place, lis- 
tened in anxious suspense to the slightest sound. At 
length, a heavy footstep was heard upon the stair ; it 
approached nearer ; it reached the landing : and the 
father staggered into the room. 

The girl saw that he was intoxicated, and advanced 
with the candle in her hand to meet him ; she stopped 
short, gave a loud scream, and fell senseless on the 
ground. She had caught sight of the shadow of a man 
reflected on the floor. They both rushed in, and in 
another instant the young man was a prisoner, and hand- 
cuffed. 

“ Very quietly done,” said one of the men to his com- 
panion, “ thanks to the old man. Lift up the girl, Tom 
— Come, come, it’s no use crying, young woman. It’s 
all over now, and can’t be helped.” 

The young man stooped for an instant over the girl, 
and then turned fiercely round upon his father, who had 
reeled against the wall, and was gazing on the group 
with drunken stupidity. 

“ Listen to me, father,” he said, in a tone that made 
t*Iie drunkard’s flesh creep. “ IMy brother’s blood, and 
mine, is on your head : I never had kind look, or word, 
or care, from you, and, alive or dead, I never will for- 
give you. Die when you will, or how, I will be with 
you. I speak as a dead man now, and I warn you, 
father, that as surely as you must one day stand before 


THE DRUNKARD’S DEATH. 


327 


your Maker, so surely shall your children be there, hand 
in hand, to cry for judgment against you.” He raised 
his manacled hands in a threatening attitude, fixed his 
eyes on his shrinking parent, and slowly left the room ; 
and neither father nor sister ever beheld him more, on 
this side of the grave. 

When the dim and misty light of a winter’s morning 
penetrated into the narrow court, and struggled through 
the begrimed window of the wretched room, Warden 
awoke from His heavy sleep, and found himself alone. 
He rose, and looked round him ; the old flock mattress 
on the floor was undisturbed ; everything was just as he 
remembered to have seen it last : and there were no 
signs of any one, save himself, having occupied the room 
during the night. He inquired of the other lodgers, and 
of the neighboi-s ; but his daughter had not been seen or 
heard of. He rambled through the streets, and scruti- 
nized each wrotched face among the crowds that thronged 
them, witli anxious eyes. But his search was fruitless, 
and he returned to his garret when night came on, deso- 
late and weary. 

For many days he occupied himself in the same man- 
ner, but no tiace of his daughter did he meet with, and 
no word of her reached liis ears. At length he gave up 
the pursuit as hopeless. He had long thought of the 
probability of her leaving him, and endeavoring to gain 
her bread in quiet, elsewhere. Slic had left him at last 
to starve alone. He ground his teeth and cursed her ! 

He begged his bread from door to door. Every half- 
oenny he could wring from the pity or credulity of those 
to whom he addressed himself, was spent in the old way. 
A year passed over his head ; the roof of a jail was the 
5nly one that had sheltered him for many months. He 


328 


SliETCHES BY BOZ. 


slept under archways, and in brickfields — anywhere, 
where there was some warmth or shelter from the cold 
and rain. But in the last stage of poverty, disease, and 
liouseless want, he was a drunkard still. 

At last, one bitter night, he sunk down on a door-step 
faint and ill. The premature decay of vice and profligacy 
had worn him to the bone. His cheeks were hollow and 
livid; his eyes were sunken, and tlieir sight was dim. 
His legs trembled beneath his weight, and a cold shiver 
ran through every limb. 

And now the long-forgotten scenes of a misspent life 
crowded thick and fast upon him. He thought of the 
time when he had a home — a happy, cheerful home — 
and of those who peopled it, and flocked about him then, 
until the forms of his elder children seemed to rise from 
the grave, and stand about him — so plain, so clear, and 
so distinct they were, that he could touch and feel them, 
Looks that he had long forgotten were fixed upon him 
once more ; voices long since hushed in death sounded in 
his ears like the music of village bells. But it was only 
for an instant. The rain beat heavily upon him ; and 
cold and Iiunger were gnawing at his heart again. 

He rose, and dragged his feeble limbs a few paces 
further. The street was silent and empty ; the few pas- 
sengers who passed by, at that late hour, hurried quickly 
on, and his tremulous voice was lost in the violence of 
the storm. Again that heavy chill struck through his 
frame, and his blood seemed to stagnate beneath it. 
He coiled himself up in a projecting doorway, and tried 
to sleep. 

But sleep had fled from his dull and glazed eyes. 
His mind wandered strangely, but he was awake, and 
tonscious. The well-known shout of drunken mirth 


THE DRUNKARD’S DEATH. 


329 


founded in his ear, the glass was at his lipg, the board 
was covered with choice rich food — they were before 
him ; he could see them all, he had but to reach out his 
hand, and take them — and, though the illusion was 
reality itself, he knew that he was sitting alone in the 
deserted street, watching the rain-drops as they pattered 
on the stones ; that death was coming upon him by inches 
— and that there were none to care for or help him. 

Suddenly he started up, in the extremity of terror. 
He had heard his own voice shouting in the night air, 
he knew not what, or why. Hark ! A groan ! — an- 
other ! His senses were leaving him : half-formed and 
incoherent words burst from his lips ; and his hands 
sought to tear and lacerate his flesh. He was going 
mad, and he shrieked for help till his voice failed him. 

He raised his head, and looked up the long dismal 
street. He recollected that outcasts like himself, con- 
demned to wander day and night in those dreadful 
streets, had sometimes gone distracted with their own 
loneliness. He remembered to have heard many yeai*s 
before that a homeless wretch had once been found in a 
solitary corner, sharpening a rusty knife to plunge into 
his own heart, preferring death to that endless, weary, 
wandering to and fro. In an instant his resolve was 
taken, his limbs received new life ; he ran quickly from 
the spot, and paused not for breath until he reached the 
river-side. 

He crept softly down the steep stone stairs that lead 
Irom the commencement of AVaterloo Bridge, down to 
the water’s level. He crouched into a corner, and held 
his breath, as the patrol passed. Never did prisoner’s 
heart throb with the hope of liberty and life half so ea- 
gerly as did that of the wretched man at the prospect of 


830 


SKETCHES BY BOZ. 


death. The watch passed close to him, but he remain^ 
unobserved ; and after waiting till the sound of footsteps 
had died away in the distance, he cautiously descended, 
and stood beneath the gloomy arch that forms the land- 
ing-place from the river. 

The tide was in, and the water flowed at his feet. 
The rain had ceased, the wind was lulled, and all was, 
for the moment, still and quiet — so quiet, that the 
slightest sound on the opposite bank, even the rippling 
of the water against the barges that were moored there, 
was distinctly audible to his ear. The stream stole lan- 
guidly and sluggishly on. Strange and fantastic forms 
rose to the surface, and beckoned him to approach ; 
dark gleaming eyes peered from the water, and seemed 
to mock his hesitation, while hollow murmurs from be- 
hind urged him onwards. He retreated a few paces, 
took a short run, desperate leap, and plunged into the 
river. 

Not five seconds had passed when he rose to the 
water’s surface - — but what a change had taken place in 
that short time, in all his thoughts and feelings ! Life 

— life — in any form, poverty, misery, starvation — any- 
thing but death. He fought and struggled with the water 
that closed over his head, and screamed in agonies of ter- 
ror. The cui-se of his own son rang in his ears. The 
shore — but one foot of dry ground — he could almost 
touch the step. One hand’s breadth nearer, and he was 

aved — but the tide bore him onward, under the dark 
arches of the bridge, and he sank to the bottom. 

Again he rose, and struggled for life. For one instant 

— for one brief instant — the buildings on the river’s 
banks, the lights on the bridge through which the cur- 
rent had bpme him, the black water, and the fast-flying 


THE DRUNKARD'S DEATO. 


831 


doudS) were distinctly visible — once more he sunk) and 
once again he rose. Bright flames of fire shot up from 
earth to heaven, and reeled before his eyes, while the 
water thundered in his ears, and stunned him with its 
furious roar. 

A week afterwards the body was washed ashore, some 
miles down the river, a swollen and disfigured mass. Un- 
recognized and unpitied, it was borne to the grave ; and 
there it has long since mouldered away ! 


THB HRS. 


.frrAaH.fi sht 

9TO/n';80U0 — ^IJfHBitsij^ O^OW 

ss<n> qa toris frdi 'k> nqoiBft^h^hH -i.ftHn c^if ^>dii» 

f>f(t oFtH^ ^ayyq wif beta ^oov^ntl oJ dhaa 

nJt ibiw f«i>l bo£Hifjl&- bfff! wd.ai bwji^nodl ‘i3b5yr_ 

_ ? > ■ ii .*t*Kyi <!{iohwi 

amoa ^rR>d5ft borisaw aent^Etod Qil^ elnnwif^r.. A. ./ 
-nU .Ksgtni b9im^eil> bn^ Titiliow^K a.i'jvn .ijlt cr^ob^f»fjiim 
bus jav/ngo/li ol ofriodLefiw^ii ,ty>biqn<i b 
nisffTUi.'^! iit-tki byi’^bJuom eqoia gciol «w( li tjiodl 

i‘J ,i i ^irr- ,<’^t '".*v,.>|j; 

^73# tlbcaiciu e\i - ,* S3 V s:. 'Vhe i:tj£ 

isD^ ir'vTk. -6r?s^?.U; 

it* sin-risi^j #ivi. Ux’.': iU.'T T\?Ta t 'tr^pi^UCif ; 

*tws li.t: -A'-.tivr. 

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V bai "•<<13ii* M mtt tti ♦ 

eWd V VIS' V^% ♦T-tJ^iVrd ?'- . -03^:5 .y’-Ii-r. 

ffV, ; ft'^V': -T-irO^ . . ;i 'yfv^t 

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THE 


SITorfijt Of i^ans: Cljnjsttan anocv^ett. 

Published by arrangement with the Author. In uniform crown 8vo 
volumes. 

1. THE IMPROVISATORE ; or, Life in Italy. Translated by 

Mary Howitt. $1.75. 

“ As a delineation of the power of music, of art in its sunny home, 
it is unsurpassed by any one of that class of novels to which ‘ Charles 
Auchester’ and ‘Consuelo’ belong; but it is in its portraiture of 
scenery and life on the margin of the Mediterranean that it exercises 
its greatest charm. The narrative is steeped in the sunshine of Italy, 
and its descriptions glow with all the tints of the lovely peninsula.” — 
New York Evening Post. 

2. THE TWO BARONESSES. A Danish Romance. $1.75. 

“ The story is not quite so long as the other, and, probably, it did 
not stand as high in the author’s estimation ; and yet, we prefer it to 
‘ The Improvisatore.’ It is wholly Danish in the life and characters 
it portrays, in the scenery it describes, and in the coloring through- 
out.” — Worcester Spy. 

3. IN SPAIN, AND A VISIT TO PORTUGAL. A book of 

Travels. $1.75. 

•‘Making the journey were the next best thing to reading this 
book.” — Boston Commonwealth. 

4. WONDER STORIES TOLD FOR CHILDREN. With 92 

illustrations. $2.25. 

O. T. A Danish Romance. $1.75. 

“ Andersen may be ranked as one of the best of living novelists.” 
— Lewiston Journal. 

6. ONLY A FIDDLER. A Danish Romance. ^1.75. 

7. THE STORY OF MY LIFE. With a portrait of the author. 
Now first translated into English, and containing, in addition to the 

matter published in the Copenhagen edition, “The last Fourteen 
Years of my Life,” contributed especialjy to this edition by the author. 
{In press.) 

8. STORIES AND TALES. With illustrations. 

A companion volume to “Wonder Stories told for Children.” 
These two volumes contain the only complete uniform collection of 
Andersen’s famous shorter tales published in English. {In press.) 

9. IN THE HARZ MOUNTAINS. {In press.) 

10. A POETS BAZAAR. {In press.) 

11. DRAMAS AND POEMS. {In press.) 

HURD AND HOUGHTON, New York; 

H. O. HOUGHTON & CO., Riverside, Cambridge, Mass. 







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